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Mortarion in Vengeful Spirit !Spoilers!


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Warning! Spoilers!

 

 

 

I have recently read Vengeful Spirit and I am confused with Mortarion's character. I have always read him to be someone who hated Psykers and anything to do with the Warp. The old fluff I remember was that he was tricked into Joining Horus's cause by the promise to be more anti Psyker and then tricked into Daemonhood by Typhus/ Nurgle.

 

However in Vengeful Spirit he doesn't bat an eyelid when one of his long dead sons reincarnates via the Warp, even then helping him.

 

What gives? Have I missed a short story which shows his change in character?

 

The a Scars storyline shows him realising he may have been tricked, but not embracing the Warp.

 

Any ideas?

 

DM

In the 'Blades of the Traitor' anthology there's a short story called 'Daemonology' which goes some way to explain the shift in Mortarions stance on psykers. It's still not a fully justified shift, from the writings perspective, but does go some way form the hatred of psykers at Nikea through to the events of Vengeful Spirit.

Mortarion's grievance against the Emperor stems from the fact that the Emperor "stole his kill" on Barbarus. Mortarion was always someone who valued self-reliance and resilience against impossible odds. When the Emperor showed up on Barbarus (in disguise), he felt slighted because he had been the one fighting against the necromancers, with this stranger showing up at the eleventh hour to steal his glory. He vowed to kill the last necromancer (his foster father) by himself or die trying. When he was overcame by the toxic atmosphere and his foster father descended to slay him, the Emperor intervened. 

 

When Mortarion joined the Great Crusade, he felt that he did not fit in with his brothers. All were indifferent to him except Horus. As seen in Scars, the Khan rightly claimed that both he and Mortarion were outsiders - while he embraced it, Mortarion chafed against it. 

 

When Isstvan III came, Mortarion threw his lot in with Horus because he craved acceptance. Horus promised him a future where the strong shall rule the weak. His old resentments against the Emperor became magnified a hundredfold. 

 

I have not read Daemonology, but at some point Mortarion realized that he joined the wrong people. As the Khan tells him on the surface of Prospero, Mortarion hated psykers yet found himself in a movement in which psykers and other "deviants" were permitted to run amok. Mortarion was alone - he had no friends even among his so-called allies. He tried to convert the Khan to his cause. 

 

My guess is that by the time Mortarion is about to take his fleet on the voyage to Terra, he fully realizes what he had done. At this moment, Typhon panics, becalms the Death Guard in the Warp, and the rest is history. 

You might want to read Daemonology because that's almost the polar opposite of how Mortarion is being displayed. In fact, seeing everyone around him use some kind of sorcery has actually put him in the mindset of, "Hmm... maybe there is something to this garbage..."

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