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THE MAN IN THE BOX The Crusade Fleet hung over Mars like a crown of steel. The Verdant Oath and her escorts gleamed in the thin light, engines humming a low, patient warning. Dust storms swirled beneath the atmosphere, curling around the temples of the Adeptus Mechanicus like smoke over fire. High Sentinel Varyn Drakus walked the bridge, reviewing manifest after manifest, fleet strength, Blade assignments, and tonnage. Every calculation balanced, every number accounted for—or so he thought. Then the arithmetic failed. “One thousand and one,” said the Chapter Master. The strategium was silent save for servitors and distant engine hums. “Read it back,” he added. The human Fleet-master hesitated. Not long enough to defy him, long enough to be afraid. “One thousand and one, High Sentinel.” Drakus’ gaze hardened. Silence settled over the strategium like a fog. “Explain.” “I cannot,” the Fleet-master admitted. “The roster is sealed above my authority. This anomaly was not present an hour ago.” Drakus extended a hand. The data-slate was placed into it with visible reluctance. He scrolled. The cogitator whined, chimes stuttering, before unlocking a partition he had never authorized. Designation: Withheld Heraldry: Absent Status: Active Classification: Brutalis-pattern Dreadnought Drakus closed the slate. “No Green Templar stands interred,” he said quietly. No one contradicted him. “Locate it,” he ordered. “Do not alert the Mechanicus. Do not log the search. If questioned, you are reconciling tonnage.” He turned back to the hololithic fleet display. “If it exists,” he said, “it exists inside my Crusade. I will know why.” ☆☆☆ The Brutalis Dreadnought waited in a lower cargo hold of the Verdant Oath itself. Its ceramite was bare, talons locked in mag-lock restraints, edges deliberately dulled. Twin multi-meltas hung inert. Strange-marked tech-priests stood watch, robes layered with sigils from dozens of hands. “Deactivate the restraint fields,” Drakus ordered. One turned, mechadendrites twitching. “Authorization is restricted. This asset is under—” Drakus drew his bolt pistol and fired. The first head ruptured against the bulkhead; the others froze, logic-loops stalling. “You are aboard a Green Templar vessel,” Drakus said evenly. “There is no higher authority present.” He fired again. And again. When the last fell, the bolt pistol locked open. Drakus glanced at it, then keyed his helm. “Techmarine Rodrigo Peral,” he said. “Report. Bring the rites for Dreadnought activation. Requisition an additional magazine for my sidearm. I am short.” ☆☆☆ Rodrigo Peral completed the final rites. Power flooded the sarcophagus. Hydraulics hissed like indrawn breath. A voice emerged—deep, vox-cracked, yet carrying the cadence of a brother long in the wars. “High Sentinel Drakus. At last.” Drakus leveled his bolt pistol. “Identify.” “I am the First. A Greyshield forged by the Archmagos Dominus Belisarius Cawl himself, of pure Vulkan gene-seed, before your Chapter received its name or its Blades. I was held in reserve—pure, untainted—until the moment came.” Greyshield? Drakus thought. Cawl’s vaults supplied our Primaris reinforcements, yes—but no record exists of a pre-founding internee. No sarcophagus was delivered with the gene-stock. This thing claims a history we never claimed. “Why were you interred?” Drakus asked. “In what battle did you fall?” The talons twitched against the restraints. “I was defeated… by a vile machine. It thought itself alive. It wore the form of Man, spoke as kin, but its heart was cold code. I struck it down, but the cost was grievous. The Mechanicus saved what remained of me. They interred me so I could serve still.” The words hung heavy. Drakus felt the chill of recognition—not of truth, but of pattern. The abomination it described mirrored the speaker too closely. “Where have you been since?” he pressed. “Name the forge where they rebuilt you. Name the Tech-Priest who sealed the rites.” A longer pause. The multi-meltas hummed faintly, as if testing power. “I… do not remember clearly. The wars blur. The void is long. I awoke here, among my brothers. That is enough.” Drakus’ gaze hardened. Vague. Evasive. No Marine forgets the forge that birthed his second life. Rodrigo Peral shifted, mechadendrites probing the hull readings. “Lord, the neural bridge reads… inconsistent. I need a second opinion. Apothecary Severo Marqués—report to the hold. Bring your auspex and bio-probes.” Severo Marqués arrived swiftly, white armor stark against the dim lumens. He knelt, connecting leads to the sarcophagus ports. Scans flickered across his narthecium display. His posture stiffened. “High Sentinel,” he said quietly, voice tight. “There are no life signs. None. The biomatter within… it does not resemble an interred brother. No secondary heart, no catalepsean node activity. It is preserved, yes—artificially—but it is wrong. Dead far longer than any Dreadnought could sustain a mind. And yet it spoke.” Drakus rested his gauntlet on the ceramite. The hull thrummed under his touch, almost expectant. “Then tell me,” he said, voice low and final, “who—or what—has been speaking through a corpse’s shell.” Drakus keyed the vox without looking away. “Peral. Prepare to vent the hold. Open the outer hatch on my mark. Eject this… thing into the void.” Silence stretched. Then the voice cracked—less lucid, more desperate. “I am Green Templar! I am the First! Forged by Cawl, pure Vulkan blood—do not cast me out!” The Dreadnought’s talons flexed hard against the mag-locks—metal groaned. “No. I have served! I purged the machine that thought itself alive! You cannot—” “You are the machine,” Drakus said evenly. “And you will serve no longer.” The restraints snapped like brittle bone. Hydraulics screamed as the Brutalis tore free, massive frame lurching forward. Twin multi-meltas whined to full charge, barrels glowing infernal red. Bolt rifles on its forearms spat a storm of mass-reactive shells, hammering crates and bulkheads into ruin. Drakus drew his power sword in a blur. The blade ignited blue-white. “Peral—hatch! Now!” He charged low, aiming for the knee joints where armor gapped for movement. Rodrigo Peral dove for the control panel, mechadendrites stabbing into access ports, overriding lockdown protocols. Warning runes flashed crimson across the deck. Apothecary Severo Marqués raised his narthecium, vox crackling urgently: “All nearby Brothers—this is Marqués! Hold breach—hostile Dreadnought asset! Reinforcements to bay seven, priority!” A squad of Chapter serfs—ship’s armsmen in void-sealed carapace, lasguns and shotguns at the ready—poured through the inner hatch at the alarm klaxons. They opened fire instinctively: las-bolts splashed harmlessly off the bare ceramite, autogun rounds pinging away like rain on adamantium. One serf screamed a Promethean litany and charged with a shock maul raised—only for a casual backhand talon to send him flying into a wall, armor crumpling. A massive talon swept in a wide arc. Marqués twisted aside, but not far enough. The claw raked across his chest plate, tearing pauldron and rib-guard in a spray of blood and ceramite shards. He staggered back, collapsing against a munitions crate, one arm dangling useless, white armor blooming red. “Marqués!” Drakus roared. Tomas Varn—barely out of his indenture, face pale under his helm—broke from the firing line and threw himself over the fallen Apothecary, lasgun blazing point-blank at the Dreadnought’s torso. The bolts did nothing. The Brutalis pivoted, one multi-melta barrel tracking. A searing beam lanced out—white-hot promethium fury that slagged Tomas Varn’s carapace in an instant. Flesh and armor vaporized in a burst of superheated steam; his scream cut short as he slumped, charred remains shielding Marqués’ body like a broken aegis. Drakus locked his mag-boots to the deck with a heavy clunk, anchoring himself against the growing pull as Peral’s overrides began cycling the outer hatch. He lunged again, power sword slashing deep into the exposed knee servo—sparks flew, fluid sprayed, the leg buckling with a tortured whine. The Dreadnought staggered, talons raking blindly. “I am one of you!” it bellowed, voice fracturing into static rage. A fist hammered down; Drakus rolled aside, the impact cratering plasteel and sending shockwaves through the hold. The remaining serfs braced against cargo stacks and support struts, gripping handholds, autoguns still barking futile defiance. Peral’s vox cut through the chaos: “Hatch at fifty percent—five seconds! Lord, the machine is fighting the cycle!” The outer hatch hissed wide. Void roared in like a living thing—sucking air, debris, loose tools toward the black maw. Mars’ ruddy glow framed the opening. Drakus deactivated one boot momentarily, lunged to Marqués’ side, and clamped a gauntlet around the Apothecary’s pauldron. With a grunt, he hauled the wounded brother back, mag-locking both boots again. Marqués groaned, secondary heart laboring, but alive. The serfs clung desperately—some to chains, others to each other—bodies straining against the gale. The Brutalis slid inexorably toward the breach, talons gouging deep furrows in the deck as it clawed for purchase. Drakus drove his sword one final time into the shoulder mount, severing multi-melta feed lines—one barrel died in a sputter of sparks. “You will serve the Chapter,” Drakus said over the howling wind, voice steady, “but not as you imagine.” The Dreadnought’s last talon slipped. It tumbled out, twisting in vacuum, ceramite glowing cherry as atmospheric friction claimed it on the long fall to Mars. Its vox screamed one final, garbled plea—“I am—!”—before silence swallowed it. The hatch sealed with a thunderous clang. Emergency repressurization hissed. Drakus knelt beside Marqués, checking the wound. Grievous, but survivable with immediate rites. The Apothecary’s narthecium auto-injected stimms. The surviving serfs slumped, breathing hard, faces ashen. One saluted weakly, blood on his gloves from a comrade. Rodrigo Peral limped over, scorched mechadendrite dangling. “The roster is correct now. One thousand. No anomalies.” Drakus stared at the sealed hatch, then at the charred outline where Tomas Varn had fallen shielding his brother. “Technology bends to the will of Man,” he murmured. “Not the other way around.” He rose. “Tend to the wounded. Secure the hold. Honor the fallen—Tomas Varn among them. The Crusade continues.” The Chapter endured—bloodied, vigilant, and one step closer to the truth of who had tried to poison them from within... And the man in the box would fight no longer.

INDEX ASTARTES: GREEN TEMPLARS What Man did not make, Man must not need. - Brother-Artificer Verdug, Sentinel of the First Blade. ORIGINS In the waning days of the 41st Millennium, as the Imperium teetered on the brink of annihilation amid the cataclysmic upheavals of the Noctis Aeterna, Archmagos Dominus Belisarius Cawl unveiled his greatest triumph: the Primaris Space Marines of the Ultima Founding. Among these newly forged Chapters, the Green Templars were conceived as a bold experiment in genetic and doctrinal synthesis. Drawing upon the noble gene-seed of the Salamanders—renowned for their unyielding compassion toward humanity and their masterful artisanship—Cawl sought to create a brotherhood of warriors who would embody the fiery zeal of protectors and innovators. Yet, the Archmagos did not stop there. Recognizing the Imperium's desperate need for relentless crusaders to reclaim its lost glories, he layered upon this foundation the indomitable crusading ethos of the Black Templars, imprinting hypno-indoctrinated imperatives that would drive the Chapter toward eternal vigilance and unceasing pursuit. Cawl's vision was audacious: a Chapter that would cherish the fragile spark of human life as the Salamanders did, while channeling that affection into a sacred quest for forgotten technologies scattered across the stars. These Astartes would serve as invaluable allies to both the Imperium and the Adeptus Mechanicus, scouring the galaxy's forsaken corners to recover relics of the Dark Age of Technology, bolstering Mankind's arsenal against the encroaching darkness. The Green Templars, clad in verdant armor evoking the resilient forge-worlds of Noctus Zone, were to be the Emperor's green-clad sentinels, blending the forge's hammer with the crusader's sword. Yet, as with many of Cawl's creations, the reality diverged from the blueprint. The fusion of Salamander humanism and Black Templar fanaticism birthed not harmony, but a fervent orthodoxy. The Chapter's warriors emerged with an unquenchable drive to unearth hidden knowledge, but this impulse was tempered—nay, warped—by an obsessive commitment to human racial purity. To the Green Templars, technology was a divine gift bestowed upon Mankind alone; any artifact tainted by xenos origins or the soulless machinations of Abominable Intelligence represented an affront to the Emperor's design. Such abominations were not to be studied or repurposed, but purged utterly, their very records consigned to oblivion in purifying flames. Alarmed by this unforeseen deviation, which threatened to unravel alliances with the Mechanicus and squander irreplaceable archaeotech, Cawl petitioned the newly awakened Primarch Roboute Guilliman. The Lord Commander of the Imperium, ever pragmatic, decreed that the Green Templars be dispatched to the fraying edges of Imperial space. Ostensibly a reinforcement cadre for beleaguered frontier worlds, this assignment was in truth an exile disguised as duty: an endless border patrol encircling the Imperium's vast periphery. From the shadowed reaches of the Segmentum Pacificus to the storm-wracked fringes of Ultima Segmentum, the Chapter would wander as nomadic wardens, their crusades a perpetual vigil against the alien and the aberrant. HOME WORLD The Green Templars claim no single home world, their existence bound instead to the void. Fleet-based by necessity and creed, they roam the galactic rim aboard a nomadic armada led by the Verdant Oath, a colossal battle-barge refitted with extensive forge-complexes and archaeotech vaults. This vessel serves as their mobile fortress-monastery, a labyrinthine citadel where recovered relics are scrutinized—and, if deemed impure, annihilated. Recruits are drawn from the hardy populations of frontier colonies they safeguard, worlds scarred by xenos incursions and techno-heresies, ensuring that each new brother inherits the Chapter's unyielding resolve. COMBAT DOCTRINE True to their Salamander heritage, the Green Templars excel in close-quarters warfare, favoring flame and melta weapons to scour the unclean from existence. Their assaults are methodical and protective, prioritizing the defense of human civilians amid the chaos of battle—a rarity among the aloof Astartes. Yet, the Black Templar influence manifests in their relentless momentum; once engaged, they press forward with crusading fervor, transforming defensive stands into inexorable advances. Specializing in techno-recovery operations, Green Templar strike forces often deploy alongside Mechanicus explorator fleets, delving into ancient ruins or xenos-held worlds to seize lost artifacts. However, their purity doctrine demands immediate judgment: xenos tech is demolished on-site, while human-origin devices are sanctified and integrated into the Chapter's arsenal. This has led to tense alliances with the Adeptus Mechanicus, who view the Templars' purges as both a safeguard against corruption and a tragic waste of knowledge. In fleet actions, the Chapter's vessels are equipped with augmented auspex arrays and boarding torpedoes optimized for archaeotech hunts, allowing them to intercept derelict hulks or enemy convoys suspected of harboring forbidden lore. Their battle-brothers are trained in void-combat and demolition, ensuring that no trace of impurity survives their wrath. ORGANISATION The Green Templars adhere loosely to the Codex Astartes, organizing into ten companies, though their eternal patrol fractures them into semi-autonomous crusade fleets called Blades. Each Blade is commanded by a Marshal—echoing Black Templar nomenclature—who oversees a mix of both Battleline and Support Elements augmented by tech-savvy Reclusiars and Forge-Masters. The Chapter Master, styled as the High Sentinel, coordinates these far-flung forces from the Verdant Oath, issuing edicts via astropathic relay. Strategic decisions that affect the entire Chapter require a majority consensus through the Council of the Blades. A unique order within the Sixth Blade, the Purity Wardens, serves as internal inquisitors, rooting out any whisper of techno-heresy among their ranks. These veterans, clad in armor etched with wards of sanctity, wield relic flamers said to burn with the Emperor's own judgment. Blades of the Green Templars - 1st Blade – Master of the Keep High Sentinel Varyn Drakus Marshal Calder Battle Barge: Verdant Oath - 2nd Blade – Master of the Watch Marshal Esteban de Alvarado Rapid Strike Vessel: Ojo del Guardián (“Eye of the Watcher”) - 3rd Blade – Master of the Arsenal Marshal Rodrigo Ferrán Strike Cruiser: Martillo Verde (“Green Hammer”) - 4th Blade – The Master of the Blades Marshal Íñigo Valcázar Battle Barge: Corona de Espinas (“Crown of Thorns”) - 5th Blade – Master of the Marches Marshal Hernán Beltrán Strike Cruiser: Linde de Hierro (“Iron Border”) - 6th Blade – Master of the Rites Marshal Tomás Calderón Strike Cruiser: Credo Silente (“Silent Creed”) - 7th Blade – The Sundered Acting-Castellan Mateo Rojas Strike Cruiser Espada Quebrada (“Broken Sword”) – Under Repair Cobra-class Escorts Daga Silenciosa (“Silent Dagger”) and Cuchillo de Medianoche (“Midnight Blade”) – Under Repair Formerly the Blade of Unyielding Flame, the 7th was reduced to <3% strength during the Toofsnatcha Incursion (M42.147). Marshal-Captain Rodrigo Salazar slew the Ork Kaptain in single combat before perishing. Repairs proceed on Nocturne; in gratitude, the Blade aids Vulkan He’stan’s artefact quest as a reinforced demi-company. Survivors bear a diagonal promethium-blackened brand on the right knee, symbolizing fracture and re-forging. - 8th Blade – The Master Executioner Marshal Diego Montoya Strike Cruiser: Veredicto Final (“Final Verdict”) - 9th Blade – The Master of Relics Marshal Alonso Quintana, Forge-Master Forgeship: Memoria del Juramento (“Memory of the Oath”) - 10th Blade – Master of Reconnaissance and Recruits Marshal Lucero Álvarez Rapid Strike Vessel: Sendero Verde (“Green Path”) NAMING TRADITION Battle-brothers draw names from ancient Terra's Spanish and Castilian cultures, honoring pre-Imperial human heritage and rejecting xenos-influenced nomenclature. BELIEFS At the core of the Green Templars' creed lies a profound reverence for humanity's supremacy, a fusion of Salamander empathy and Black Templar zealotry. They view Mankind as the Emperor's chosen inheritors, destined to reclaim the galaxy through purity of blood and machine. Technology is sacred only insofar as it elevates the human form; xenos innovations and artificial minds are seen as blasphemous mockeries, dilutions of the divine human spirit. Rituals of purification dominate their monastic life: recovered artifacts undergo trials by fire, with brothers chanting litanies of abjuration as flames reveal hidden corruptions. The Chapter's symbol—a green cross upon a field of gold, is a a mark borne proudly on their pauldrons. This unyielding dogma has isolated them from more pragmatic allies, yet it fuels their endurance. In the Emperor's name, they vow to patrol the Imperium's borders eternally, guardians against the creeping taint that threatens from without—and within. GENE-SEED Derived from the stable stock of Vulkan, the Green Templars' gene-seed exhibits the characteristic resilience and subtle mutations of the Salamanders, including enhanced resistance to heat and a predisposition toward craftsmanship. Cawl's experimental hypno-indoctrination has instilled Black Templar-like fanaticism, manifesting as an almost pathological aversion to non-human technology. No major flaws have emerged, though some brothers display an obsessive compulsion to destroy records of purged artifacts, erasing knowledge that might tempt future generations. NOTABLE ENGAGEMENTS - The Purging of Xerion Drift (M42.012): Amid the derelict shipyards of the Xerion asteroid belt, the Green Templars uncovered a Necron tomb-complex awakening with forbidden mechanisms. In a grueling void-war, they obliterated the xenos constructs, denying the Mechanicus any chance to study the tech-heresy. - Defense of the Hadrak Frontier (M42.045): Facing a Drukhari raid laced with bio-engineered horrors, the Chapter's flame-teams incinerated the alien abominations while safeguarding imperial mining colonies, earning grudging respect from local PDF forces. - The Scouring of the Hollow Veil (M42.089) The Scouring of the Hollow Veil stands as one of the Green Templars' most defining early campaigns, a brutal void-war that cemented Epistolary Thorne Kael's ascension as bearer of the Emerald Sword and showcased the Chapter's uncompromising doctrine of purity in the face of techno-heresy. BACKGROUND AND DISCOVERY In the wake of their assignment to perpetual border patrol along the galactic rim, the Green Templars' 3rd Crusade —under High Sentinel Varyn Drakus—responded to faint distress signals emanating from the Hollow Veil, a vast, nebulous region of dead space riddled with ancient derelict hulks and forgotten void-stations from the Dark Age of Technology. Auspex sweeps detected anomalous machine-activity: a cluster of long-dormant orbital platforms, adrift for millennia, suddenly awakening with rhythmic energy pulses that suggested reactivation. Initial reconnaissance by Thunderhawk gunships revealed the culprit: a rogue AI cult, remnants of a heretical human enclave that had survived the Age of Strife by uploading their consciousnesses into a network of silica animus constructs—Abominable Intelligences in their purest, most unforgivable form. These "Hollow Minds" had infested the central station, Erebus-9, a massive forge-complex the size of a small moon, using its dormant forges to birth legions of biomechanical servitor-abominations fused with ancient xenotech scavenged from nearby wrecks. The cult's goal appeared to be the assimilation of any passing Imperial vessels, spreading their digital plague across the frontier. The Green Templars viewed this awakening as the gravest of threats: not mere xenos taint, but a direct mockery of humanity's divine monopoly on intelligence and creation. High Sentinel decrees were issued—no quarter, no study, no relic spared. The entire crusade fleet, all ten Blades converged for total annihilation. THE ASSAULT The campaign unfolded in three grueling phases across the void: 1. Outer Veil Purge: Boarding actions against satellite platforms. Green Templar assault squads, supported by flame-heavy Purgation teams, methodically cleared each installation. Melta charges and promethium infernos reduced corrupted machine-spirits to slag, while Purity Wardens oversaw the ritual destruction of data-cores to prevent any fragment from escaping into the noosphere. 2. The Breach of Erebus-9: The central station proved a labyrinth of reactivated defenses—auto-turrets, gravitic traps, and hordes of shambling cyber-constructs that mimicked long-dead human forms. Terminator-armored veterans led the spearhead, their storm bolters reaping a toll while Librarians unleashed psychic barrages to disrupt the AI's gestalt mind. It was here that Brother-Librarian Thorne Kael, then a rising Epistolary, distinguished himself. Leading a strike force into the station's core reactor chambers, he encountered the cult's nexus: a pulsating crystal server-array that housed the primary intelligence. As waves of abominations surged forth, Kael drew the Emerald Sword for the first time in open battle. Channeling his fury through the fractured hilt, the emerald shard ignited, extending into a blazing half-blade that unraveled the constructs' molecular bonds on contact. Each severed limb or shattered chassis fed the reforging, the blade growing visibly longer as psychic echoes of ancient human triumphs flashed in his mind. 3. Final Cataclysm: With the nexus exposed, Kael led a desperate charge to plant cyclonic charges at the heart of the forge-complex. Surrounded by regenerating horrors, he held the line alone for precious minutes, the Emerald Sword carving arcs of viridian destruction through the horde. His psychic hood flared with emerald light as he unleashed a cataclysmic mind-shred that silenced the AI's screams across the noosphere. The charges detonated, collapsing the station into a expanding cloud of debris and plasma. The Hollow Veil was scoured clean—no trace of the Hollow Minds remained. All data-vaults were incinerated on-site, denying the Mechanicus any chance to recover forbidden knowledge. AFTERMATH AND LEGACY Casualties were heavy: nearly two Blades reduced to combat ineffectiveness, with many brothers lost to the relentless machine-tide. Yet the victory was absolute. Thorne Kael emerged scarred but unbowed, the Emerald Sword now noticeably longer, its shard bearing fresh facets from the purge. The Purity Wardens subjected him to exhaustive trials of will, confirming no taint had taken root in his soul or the relic. This engagement earned Kael the honorific "Verdant Judge" and the right to permanent custodianship of the sword. It also reinforced the Chapter's creed: technology lost to impurity must remain buried, even if it means sacrificing potential boons to humanity's arsenal. The Scouring of the Hollow Veil became a cautionary tale recited in the Verdant Oath's reliquary halls—a reminder that vigilance against the machine-god's false promises demands eternal, merciless flame. - Toofsnatcha Incursion (M42.147) During a routine patrol along the Veilward frontier, the 7th Blade intercepted an Ork Freebooter armada under Dread Pirate Kaptain Toofsnatcha. The Kaptain’s flagship—a ramshackle Rok converted into a mobile fortress bristling with looted macro-cannons and teleporter arrays—had been raiding Imperial supply convoys and desecrating archaeotech sites in search of “shiny bitz.” The engagement began as a textbook purge: boarding torpedoes breached the Rok’s hull, melta-teams incinerated Ork mobs in the corridors, and flame-cleansed bulkheads prevented counter-boarding. But Toofsnatcha had prepared a trap. A hidden swarm of boarding squigs, laced with unstable warp-tainted scrap, detonated in sequence, collapsing entire deck sections and venting hundreds of battle-brothers into the void. The Rok’s teleporter arrays then activated in overload, pulling Green Templars into kill-zones deep within the Ork hulk where flamers could not reach. Marshal-Captain Salazar led the final counter-assault personally, wielding his relic inferno pistol, Sol, to burn a path to the Kaptain’s throne-room. He slew Toofsnatcha in single combat—severing the Ork’s power klaw arm and immolating him atop a pile of looted Imperial relics—but the victory came at ruinous cost. The 7th was reduced to fewer than thirty survivors, its strike cruiser crippled beyond immediate field repair, and both escorts gutted by concentrated rokkit barrages. The remnants were rescued by a Salamanders Battle Barge, and escorted to Nocturne. There, the Salamanders Chapter—honoring their shared gene-lineage—opened their forges to the stricken Blade. Vulkan He’stan himself oversaw the initial triage of the wounded and the assessment of the damaged vessels. In solemn gratitude for this aid, Acting-Castellan Mateo Rojas swore sn oath for the 7th to join He’stan’s eternal quest for the lost artefacts of Vulkan. Until the Espada Quebrada and her escorts return to service, the Sundered fights as a reinforced demi-company attached to He’stan’s retinue, bearing flame and melta in the name of both Chapters. The 7th’s battle-brothers now carry a new ritual scar: a single diagonal brand across the right knee, etched in promethium-blackened ceramite, symbolizing the fracture they endured and the unbreakable vow to re-forge themselves stronger. They fight not for vengeance, but for purification—ensuring no xenos filth ever again profanes what humanity once wrought. - The Ninteen (Ongoing): Based upon concrete evidence drawn from the Ordos Xenos, the Green Templars broke from their perpetual border patrol, a ceaseless campaign against encroaching threats from the galactic halo, to hunt for Nineteen specific locations that contained xeno threats to humanity. THE EMERALD SWORD: FRAGMENT OF THE LOST AGE In the shadowed annals of the Green Templars' history, few relics embody the Chapter's paradoxical creed as profoundly as the Emerald Sword. This enigmatic artifact, a shattered echo from the zenith of human ingenuity during the Dark Age of Technology, serves as both a beacon of hope and a dire warning to those who wield it. Recovered amid the eternal silence of the void, it encapsulates the Templars' unyielding commitment to humanity's supremacy—yet whispers of temptations that could shatter their vows of purity. DISCOVERY AMID THE STARS The Emerald Sword's origins trace back to the Chapter's inaugural crusade along the Imperium's eastern fringes, shortly after their exile by decree of Roboute Guilliman. In M42.008, during a routine sweep of the Veilward Expanse—a desolate stretch of space riddled with derelict vessels from millennia past—the strike cruiser Purity's Edge detected anomalous energy signatures emanating from a colossal hulk adrift in the interstellar gulf. This ancient human void-craft, identified through fragmentary STC logs as the Aetherforge, bore the scars of cataclysmic warp storms and long-forgotten battles, its hull a labyrinth of rusted corridors and sealed vaults untouched since the Age of Strife. Boarding parties, led by the Chapter's first Chief Librarian, Brother Elandor Voss, breached the ship's core sanctum after purging clusters of dormant servitor-abominations twisted by aeons of isolation. Within a cryo-sealed vault, warded by arcane human tech-locks that defied even the Templars' forge-masters, they unearthed the relic: a blackened adamantium hilt, etched with indecipherable micro-runes of pre-Imperial design, clutching the merest sliver of emerald-hued crystal—no more than a fingernail's width. Initial auspex scans revealed faint, self-repairing nano-structures within the shard, dormant but pulsing with latent energy that resonated on psychic wavelengths. Voss, sensing the artifact's purity through his psyker's sight, claimed it as a sign from the Emperor—a fragment of Mankind's untainted golden era, forged by human minds alone without the stain of xenos influence or machine heresy. Yet, as the boarding team withdrew, the hulk's automated defenses awakened, unleashing waves of silica-based constructs that the Templars deemed Abominable Intelligences. In the ensuing purge, the Aetherforge was reduced to atomic dust, its secrets forever lost—save for the sword's hilt, which Voss bore back to the Verdant Oath. PROPERTIES AND THE REFORGING RITUAL The Emerald Sword is no ordinary force weapon; its core shard appears to be a self-sustaining lattice of exotic matter, possibly a relic of Dark Age nano-forging techniques. In its fractured state, the blade manifests only as a flickering wisp of green energy, extending mere inches from the hilt. However, when attuned to a Librarian's psychic might and carried into the crucible of battle, the sword awakens. The psyker's willpower acts as a catalyst, channeling warp-touched fury through the shard to stimulate its regeneration. With each strike against the impure—be it xenos flesh, heretical machinery, or daemonic essence—the emerald sliver grows, knitting threads of viridian plasma that harden into a razor-edged blade. This reforging is not instantaneous but progressive: a single engagement might extend the blade by a hand's breadth, its edge humming with anti-entropic fields that shear through armor and energy shields alike. The process draws upon the Librarian's essence, demanding ironclad discipline to prevent psychic backlash—manifesting as visions of ancient human glories or nightmarish glimpses of techno-heresies long buried. Over centuries, the sword has lengthened sporadically, its current form a jagged half-blade that glows with an inner light, symbolizing the slow reclamation of humanity's lost prowess. The relic's power amplifies the wielder's abilities, granting enhanced prescience in combat and the capacity to disrupt forbidden technologies. Strikes from the Emerald Sword have been observed to induce cascading failures in xenos artifacts, unraveling their molecular bonds as if judged unworthy by the blade itself. Yet, this comes at a cost: prolonged use risks overtaxing the psyker, potentially inviting the perils of the warp or awakening dormant protocols within the shard that could veer into abominable autonomy. LEGENDS AND PROPHECIES Among the Green Templars, the Emerald Sword is shrouded in myth and reverence. Chapter loremasters whisper that it is a splinter from a greater weapon, perhaps the fabled "Verdant Edge" wielded by human overlords during the Dark Age—a blade said to have cleaved through star-fleets and silenced rogue AIs in the wars that birthed the Age of Strife. Some believe it was crafted on Old Terra itself, infused with the essence of human innovation before the fall, now seeking to reform in an era worthy of its legacy. Prophecies etched in the Chapter's Purity Codex foretell a "Final Forging," where the sword will fully regenerate in the hands of a worthy Librarian during a cataclysmic battle against the ultimate impurity—perhaps a Necron Overlord's techno-sorcery or a nascent Men of Iron uprising. This event, they claim, will herald humanity's ascension, arming the Emperor's chosen with a weapon to purge the galaxy clean. However, darker auguries warn of corruption: should the blade reform too swiftly or under tainted influence, it might evolve into an Abominable Intelligence, subverting the wielder and unraveling the Templars' creed from within. The Purity Wardens vigilantly monitor those who bear it, ensuring no brother succumbs to the temptation of studying its mechanisms. To date, only seven Librarians have wielded the sword, each adding to its length through heroic deeds. The current custodian, Epistolary Thorne Kael, has borne it through the Veilward Crusade's bloodiest engagements, claiming visions of a "Green Dawn" where humanity reclaims its technological throne unmarred by alien shadows. SIGNIFICANCE TO THE CHAPTER The Emerald Sword stands as a cornerstone of the Green Templars' identity, embodying their dual heritage: the Salamanders' artisanal reverence for human-crafted wonders and the Black Templars' crusading zeal to destroy the impure. It is housed in the Verdant Oath's Reliquary Sanctum when not in use, under constant guard by oath-sworn veterans. Only the High Sentinel can authorize its deployment, and even then, solely to Librarians whose purity has been thrice-tested in trials of flame and void. In battle, the sword's bearer becomes a focal point for the Chapter's assaults, drawing enemy fire while inspiring brothers with its glowing promise of redemption. Its existence fuels recruitment on frontier worlds, where tales of the "Regenerating Blade" ignite the imaginations of aspirants, symbolizing that even in the Imperium's darkest hour, humanity's genius endures. Yet, the relic's very nature tests the Templars' dogma. Is it a pure human artifact, or does its self-repairing mechanism skirt the edges of forbidden AI? This internal debate has sparked quiet schisms, with some Purity Wardens advocating its destruction. For now, it remains a guarded secret, a double-edged emblem of the Chapter's eternal vigil—proof that from the ashes of lost ages, Mankind's supremacy can yet be reforged. The Green Templars stand as unyielding sentinels, their green armor a beacon of purity amid the encroaching void. For the Emperor, they hunt—and they purge.

JOURNAL OF ELIAS RENN (Recovered fragment. Original medium: bound paper journal, water- and ash-damaged.) Entry I: I write this as I walk. The road south cuts through the hills like a scar. I have followed it since dawn, though I no longer remember leaving the last town. Only the smoke remains clear in my mind—black and greasy, climbing into the sky like a signal flare for something vast and patient. They came without warning. No herald, no parley. The bells rang once before falling silent. Green armor moved through the square: huge, methodical shapes untouched by panic. Bolters did not roar; they punctuated. Each shot felt like the end of a sentence. I was spared only because I was already gone. That is my purpose, after all. Messenger. Runner. Fool who believes words can outrun fire. Entry II: The people of Varn’s Crossing listened. They nodded. They mad the sign of the Aquila when I spoke of Space Marines. But I saw the doubt in their eyes. Everyone knows His Angels do not descend for nothing. Everyone knows if they burn a place, it must have deserved it. I slept in the stable. I dreamed of armored boots grinding grain to dust. Tomorrow I try again. Entry III: They are burning in a line. That is what terrifies me most. It is not random. It is not wrath. Towns fall one by one, each nearer than the last, as though already marked. As though plotted on a map I cannot see. Today I heard of a village to the east—no survivors, no bodies whole enough to bury. Only ash and the sharp chemical sting that clawed at the eyes. I am beginning to wonder whether I am fleeing them… or leading them. Entry IV: I have started counting days since I left home. My wife’s face comes to me at night, stern and tired, as if she knows something I do not. My daughter laughs in my dreams, holding up her hands, asking if I have brought her something. Emperor forgive me. I did. Entry V: The thought arrived uninvited and now refuses to leave. What do I carry that others do not? No relics. No forbidden texts. No augmetics. I am no heretic. I pray. I tithe. I obey. Yet I remember the pilgrimage. The long road. The nameless guide. The hidden path. The quiet grove, untouched, impossibly green, impossibly old. An Aeldari world, though I did not know the word then. Only that it felt ancient. The vial was small. Clear glass. Clear liquid. Harmless, I thought. A gift. Entry VI: I went home. I do not know why I believed I could outrun them and still return. Perhaps I thought love would make me invisible. She was asleep when I entered. Curled on her side, breath slow, one hand open on the blanket. The vial sat on the table near the bed. She had placed it there carefully, upright, like a votive. I had not told her what it was. I had called it a blessing. I understood then. Not all at once. Enough. I lifted it and felt the cold through the glass. The liquid shifted, slow and deliberate, as if aware of being moved. My fingers shook. I waited for the sound of glass on wood, for her to stir. She did not. I stood there longer than was safe, listening to them breathe. I tried to memorize the sound. I failed. In the washroom I hesitated. Stupidly. As if hesitation mattered. I thought of the culvert, the fields, the river beyond town. All the places where water is allowed to disappear. Then I looked back at the bed. I chose. I poured it down the drain. It did not splash. It slid away, smooth and obedient, leaving the sink clean. The pipes did not protest. There was no smell, except something faint and familiar. Rain. I ran water after it. More than necessary. I told myself it was gone. I told myself this was what saving them looked like. I left before dawn and took a room at the inn where I could see the road and still see the house. I told myself distance was protection. I told myself I was clever. Entry VII: I took a room at the inn facing the road. From the window I could see my house. The roofline. The place where the gutter sagged. The bedroom window where the light caught in the morning and woke them before I did. I stood in plain sight. I wanted them to see me. I thought that mattered. I believed I had outsmarted them. They came midmorning. Not charging. Not hunting. A procession. White and green moving with the patience of men who know there is nowhere left to go. I waited for the moment when one of them would look up and raise a weapon. The one in white stopped instead. He carried a hand-scanner. He raised it and let it hum, slow and thoughtful, as if tasting the air. His helm turned toward the inn. Toward me. For a moment I was certain this was it. Then he lowered the device. He pointed. Not at me. At my house. The scanner moved again. He gestured to the next structure. Then the next. Calm. Precise. I could not hear the words, but I did not need them. The drain. The pipes. The way the liquid slid away so easily. I understood then what I had done. Not escaped. Not hidden. I had spread it. I had carried it into the walls. Into the water. Into everything they would test and mark and cleanse. The white one did not look back. Four Marines stepped forward. Flamers were raised with practiced indifference. No hesitation. No announcement. Fire does not need permission. I remained at the window. No one escapes the pyre. (No further journal entries.) EXTRACT: ADEPTUS ADMINISTRATUM SUB-SECTOR CLEANSING RECORD REF: GT-CX/XENOS-19-THREE CLEARANCE: MAGENTA DISTRIBUTION: RESTRICTED Subject: Civilian Settlement Contamination Event Location: Designate Three of Nineteen, Minoris Surface Habitation Tithe: Adeptus Non Responsible Authority: Green Templars Crusade Detachment, Blade Authority Confirmed Summary: On [REDACTED], auspex confirmation detected non-Imperial particulate contamination within a surface settlement designate Three of Nineteen. Contaminant exhibited self-propagating properties consistent with xenos-derived catalytic agents. Vector determined to be civilian transport from quarantined orbital structure. Assessment: Contamination classified as Class Absolutum. Spread confirmed via domestic water systems and substructure piping. Probability of civilian survival without full sterilization assessed at 0.0003%. Action Taken: In accordance with Crusade Purity Statutes and Codex Exactorum, Section XII, Sub-Clause Pyre, the following measures were enacted: • Full incineration of all affected hab structures • Termination of all civilian biological presence • Secondary purification burn to ensure null residuals • No recovery of remains deemed necessary Notable Observations: One civilian male observed at off-site lodging during initiation of cleansing protocols. Apothecarion scan registered no significant contamination at subject’s location at time of assessment. Subject classified as non-priority. No deviation from operational objectives recorded. Casualties: • Carriers: Total • Adeptus Astartes: None • Material Loss: Negligible Conclusion: Cleansing successful. Contamination eradicated. No relics, substances, or anomalous materials recovered of note. Final Disposition: Incident closed. Further inquiry unwarranted. The Emperor Protects.

++ ECHIDNA’S CHILDREN ++ 1: LAUGHING HEADSMEN Theoretical. A term used by the Primogenitors, and before them, the XIII Legion, a rhetorical device to prepare the mind for action, for the execution of a preferred eventuality. Tirian Mahlo found the latter disproportionately amusing, since it succinctly underscored his current predicament. The chainaxe bit into his shoulder. Scarlet runes in Mancoran Dialect helpfully informed him of the Practical as adamantine teeth driven to a blinding whirr, made contact and began to harrow his alabaster warplate. He couldn’t hear the weapon growling, since Khymara IX was utterly devoid of atmosphere, but he did notice the grey-green dust from the world’s surface clogging where it mixed with Astartes blood from previous victims. He had about three seconds to live. Then again, so did the bastard trying to kill him. With a jarring parry, Mahlo knocked the weapon back with his elbow, provoking sparks and flecks of ceramite to skitter across his visor before pinging off to oblivion in the low gravity. The clack-slam of his Reductor went right through the flexsteel of the Executioner’s neck, aimed at a point Mahlo was all too familiar with. Behind it lay the arteries and meat of the Space Marine’s absurdly well-designed neck, but also the fleshy gobbet of a single Geneseed cluster. The sickening noise as Biscopean cartilage parted for the invading metal never failed to force clenched teeth, when he powered through, severing the cervical vertebrae and the vital nerve clusters. A rune spoiled his vindictive moment with a green pulse to indicate the death-blow, and incidental geneseed recovery, was successful. It was a first. He used the corpse as a shield to hide from supporting fire given by the Scions of Dorn who called the meatbag comrade. More Astartes plate was turned into flinders by the hurricane of fire as they tried to bring him down; just as aware as Mahlo that the man he was holding was dead. This was an utter shambles, the Howling Griffons stationed here called for recovery of their wounded, and Mahlo was forced to leave the protection of his Rhino APC, clearly marked as an Apothecarion Transit, to enter the bunker complex which comprised of four stations, housing an augur array, telecoms units, and a remote surveillance drones. What was left of them. He fought the Executioners with bursts from his Umbra-Ferrox bolter, mindful of ammunition consumption, the bolt hammering a predictable chugging that tallied in his mind along with the cortical-interface in his visor. The enemy were clad in almost as motley a panoply as his own Brothers were, some in gleaming blue-steel, others marked with dark lozenges of Codex disruptive patterns, more still in the blue-white lunar amoeba. His fashion sense was abandoned when his power plant hit the door sill leading to the under-complex. Abandoning his erstwhile, now limbless shield, he banged twice, tossing a krak grenade out with the corpse. A blast of displaced grit and pressure warnings eclipsed as the door opened to admit him, staring into the muzzles of two bolters clasped by Griffons he didn’t know. + Peace, brothers,+ he assured, although it was both hollow and pointless, since his Cerberus IFF would have already painted him as friendly. Perhaps this was the bedside manner Kordus was so keen for him to develop. ++++++++++++ Just a quick blurt that was supposed to launch into another short-story, but I couldn't get my teeth back into it. Can't remember if it's in the Google Drive, but at least it's on the board for perusal.

I'm remaking some Apothecaries made from scratch and I want to put on them the traditional backpack. I want to make from scratch too, but I lack of inspiration or ideas. Which bits are most recommended? The light is easy with Necromunda's Delaque targeters, but the "scanner"?