Crusade Backstory

[Brother Castus]

Rise of a Marshal

After surging through the ranks of the Black Templar during the Third War for Armageddon, Castus was honorably promoted into High Marshal Helbrecht’s personal house. Soon after his duties as an honored Sword Brethren, Castus was hurled into battle. His squad’s Land Raider was destroyed by a Warboss during an assault on a bastion in a dense hive sector, but Castus and his fellow Sword Brethren pressed on towards their objective. Supported by a Brother Lorthos in his glorious Dreadnought armor, and a pair of Initiate squads, the sword brethren moved deeper into the Ork held hive under the command of Marshal Alaric. As they pressed deeper into the hive tunnels, in search of an Ork controlled hanger bay, the Black Templar began to mount casualties from opportunistic guerilla raids by the rag tag Orks. After losing Brother Lorthos to fire from a looted Leman Russ Battle Tank, the Black Templar forces came upon a Mega-Armoured Nob. Marshal Alaric charged the beast, and struck with the Faithbringer, but the weapon became lodged in its flesh and a plate of looted Rhino armour. The Mega-Armoured Nob took the chance and struck, sending the Marshal’s body sprawling to the ground. Castus charged the Xenos scum and threw his chainsword, still roaring, at the ork’s head. The holy weapon caught the ork in its eye, and the beast reeled back. Castus leapt into the air and landed on the Ork, taking hold of the Faithbringer and ripping it free of the ork’s flesh. He struck a blow to the ork’s head, cleansing the galaxy of another foul xenos scum. Castus wielded the holy relic for the next three days as the rest of the Black Templar strike force pushed to the hangar bay.

 

After discovering the bay, Castus and his brethren assaulted the foul green-skins with a righteous fury that the Ork’s had never before witnessed. After cutting down the xenos, the Black Templar planted several high explosive charges and destroyed the complex off of the surface of the Hive world. After being extracted via a high risk Thunderhawk extraction, Castus was summoned to High Marshall Helbrecht’s High Command center. The High Marshall personally recognized the bravery and valour of the Sword Brother, and promoted him to the rank of Castellan, placing two Crusader Squads and a single Black Templar Assault Squad under his command, also granting him use of the Faithbringer in his ventures during the Third War for Armageddon.

 

Castellan Castus ventured forth through the war, using lighting strike tactics and guerilla explosive techniques that made the Orks consider each step they took in his sector. After joining with the forces of Castellan Intios and Castellan Jastilus, Castus assaulted an Ork stronghold in a former manufactorum. The foul beasts had converted the heavy lifting Sentinel chassis into heavy weapons platforms, and the Black Templar forces clashes mightily with the abominable machines, crushing them beneath their righteous fury. Emperor’s Champion Drustus led the assault from the forefront, sundering a dozen of the machines with the Black Sword.

 

As the battle tore through the days, Castellan Initios was slain by a Mega-Armored Nob even as he killed the xenos. The Black Templar forces held their lines, but could not make headway into the enemy lines. After a mostly unsuccessful assault into the Templar lines, the Orks lines were vulnerable, and Castellan Castus charged into the weakness with several Crusader Squads behind him, and Emperor’s Champion Drustus beside him. Castus cut through the Ork horde, every slash bringing the Xenos death. Drustus slew Ork hero after Ork hero as the rest of the Black Templar forces surged through the gap, tearing into the Ork lines with righteous fury. The Ork lines buckled under the massive assault, and Castus masterfully commanded the Templar forces to their greatest effect. After a few hours of brutal fighting in the streets around the manufactorum, Castus emerged victorious and sent word to the Black Templar command cadre of the victory.

 

The assault on the Manufactorum proved to be Castellan Castus’ last major offensive during the Third War for Armageddon. The aftermath of the manufactorum battles saw the promotion of Castus aboard the massive battle-barge Eternal Crusader, to the rank of Marshall. Under his new command was Reclusiarch Pontius, a man of surpassing faith and unmatched fervor. Castus gathered around him a command squad from the veterans of the Third War, and pressed on into new crusades aboard Terra’s Hammer, the battle barge assigned to his crusade. Terra’s Hammer lacks somewhat the carrying capacity of more mainline Battle Barges, but has in its vast chassis, the manufacturing capabilities of a small forgeship. From the depths of the knowledge of the Techmarines aboard Terra’s Hammer, one suit of masterfully crafted armour was forged. Made from the merging of parts of Tactical Dreadnought armour, Power Armour, blessings of the Emperor, prayers to the Omnissiah, relics of antiquity and his heraldry scroll. The suit took a full decade to complete in its entirety and stands alone in its mobility and ability to protect the occupant. The suit integrates several rarities of technology that were bequeathed to Castus upon his start of a new crusade. Marshal Castus now wears The Armour of Contempt into each battle he joins.

 

Sorry for the wall of text

(The actual document is seven pages long... I'll post the rest of it if you Brothers enjoy this much)

 

I just wanted some feedback on the back story for my crusade.

 

Thanks!

 

Edit: Format change to be more readable. Thank you, Brother Loring

[Brother Loring]

Very nice. I liked the story a lot. Is the whole document 7 pages of the same expanded or more adventures of the newly promoted Marshal Castus?

 

I for one would like to read it either way.

 

One thing I would suggest is spacing the paragraphs a bit - just a line inbetween them. It makes it look longer but less of a 'wall' as you've said! It makes it a lot easier on the eyes, especially on a computer screen.

 

Perhaps do it as part of a blog like Acebaur's - link

[Brother Castus]

The rest of the 7 pages is more stories of the Securis Crusades. Thanks for the support and the advice! I'll post more, with the reader friendly paragraph breaks.

 

The Securis Crusades

Vindicus Crusade

Marshal Castus received word of an Ork uprising in the Calixis Sub-Sector called the Periphery and called for a crusade to destroy the foul xenos. He gathered the Fighting Companies of Castellan Mortis and Castellan Jastilus, whom he was familiar with from Armageddon. After reaching the Periphery, Castus set his fleet into motion to conquer Avitohol and Kulth. The cruiser Crusader’s Fist was dispatched to build a Chapter Keep on Cyclopea, a forgeworld located in the sub-sector. Marshal Castus brought the full bear of his personal crusade against Avitohol. Along with elements of Castellan Jastilus’ Fighting Company, Marshal Castus took the world out of greenskin contestation within a few months of fighting. The experience earned rooting out the greenskins in the hives of Armageddon served Castus’ Crusade well during the campaign for Avitohol as the last vestiges of Ork resistance on the planet shifted to guerilla tactics. Marshal Castus assigned Castellan Mortis’ Fighting Company to the final cleansing of Avitohol as he moved the rest of the Crusade to Kulth. After 83 years of combat with the Orks, the local Imperial forces had begun to wear down and lose their edge, on the other hand the Orks grew stronger and bigger with each passing year of fighting. The Black Templar arrived to the news of a Warboss named Ghazgrun Splitskull rising to power on Kulth, gathering the Orks together into a formidable force. Marshal Castus brought his Templar into play across the front lines, supporting the local PDF along the entirety of the front, reinforcing the beleaguered defenses. He kept his Sword Brethren in reserve, ready to deploy against any Ork offensive that proved too much for the reinforced line to handle.

 

During a week long clash against the greenskins over a space port, Marshal Castus caught sight of the wretched Xenos leader. Ghazgrun stomped through the Templar lines until a squad of Sword Brethren Terminators stalled him. Castus signaled for Champion Drustus to join the section of the battle that Ghazgrun fought in, at the same time moving forward through the green tide, The Faithbringer singing a hymnal to the Emperor as he cut a righteous swath through the Xenos.

 

Castus surged forwards through the press of the Ork forces, but could not make before the Templar forces split to allow Champion Drustus’ Land Raider Crusader to charge into the Ork lines. Castus watched as he slogged through the crush of bodies between him and the Warboss. Drustus flew out of the Crusader and into the Warboss’ retinue, a Crusader squad following his charge out of the Land Raider. The assault grenades gave his squad the upper hand in the fight, allowing them to lay into the Ork command cadre with unbridled fury. Greenskins fell all around the Warboss, and Ghazgrun bellowed his challenge to Champion Drustus. Drustus gripped the Black Sword tightly and met the Ork in battle, The Black Sword clashed against Ghazgrun’s power claw.

 

As Castus cut his way through the last few Orks between him and Ghazgrun, he saw the wretched Ork take hold of Drustus’s left arm and crush it with his power claw. Drustus nary even flinched, instead taking the opening and jamming the Black Sword into the mechanical monstrosity of the power claw and destroying the internal mechanisms and causing the weapon to fall limp on Ghazgrun’s arm. The Ork slashed at Drustus with his other arm, Choppa held firmly in its grasp. Champion Drustus fell, even as his Crusader squad rushed to cover the Champion’s prone form. The Warboss dropped his Choppa and grabbed at the hilt of The Black Sword, trying to claim the holy weapon as his own. Castus roared his anger at such blasphemy and hurled The Faithbringer at his quarrel.

 

The holy relic slammed into Ghazgrun, embedding itself in the Ork’s chest and sending the xenos reeling. Castus drew a power sword and continued to cut down the foes between him and his quarry. When he finally reached the foul beast, the Warboss was attempting to remove the holy weapon from its chest, to no avail. Castus walked up stoically, gripping the hilt of the Faithbringer and bringing his plasma pistol, Excutio, up to the Ork’s forehead. The furious blast of plasma from the ancient weapon ripped the Faithbringer free of the foul xeno flesh. Ghazgrun stumbled back, only slowly realizing that he had been slain. Excutio roared twice more and the foul Ork was silenced forever. Marshal Castus tore the Black Sword from Ghazgrun’s corpse and placed Champion Drustus’s body over his shoulder, bearing him back to Templar territory for proper burial ceremonies.

 

The fighting on Avitohol wore down to small bands of opportunistic Ork raiders clashing against Imperial bastions, and Castus withdrew most of his Crusade to the Chapter Keep on Cyclopea. Castus gathered the Sword Brethren in the Chapter Keep and promoted Brother Heldrik to the status of Castellan to oversee the extermination of the Ork presence in the sub-sector, leaving him the Crusader’s Fist to facilitate the undertaking.

 

Edit: Changed a spelling error