Black Legion Splinter Warband (W.I.P.)

[Julgolax]

Name: The Empyreal Host

Formerly: Proselytes

Primarch: Rogal Dorn

Progenitors: Imperial Fists

Founding: 14th Founding

Homeworld: (Fleet-based)

Fortress-Monastery: Battle Barge ​Sacral Flame

​​Leader: Jal Kaenon a.k.a. The Black Hierophant

Colors: Black and Gold

Specialty: Cultivating Heresy, Chaos Cults, Flame Weaponry

Strength: ~700 Marines, several thousands of cultists

Battlecry: Black Cleric: "We embrace the Pantheon!" Response: "Witness their might!"

 

Originally an Astartes chapter wholly devoted to the Emperor and fanatical in their belief in the Imperial Creed. The Empyreal Host was once known as the Proselytes chapter who fought to bring the Emperor's Light to abandoned and neglected human populations throughout Segmentum Obscurus. The chapter had on several occasions even fought beside their zealous brethren the Black Templars as well as the Ecclesiarchy's fanatical Adepta Sororitas in their prosecution of rebellions, xenos, mutants and even heretics. However, over the millennia the chapter had slowly and surely been manipulated by the machinations of the Alpha Legion, notorious for infiltrating and manipulating the Imperium's people since the Horus Heresy, into falling to darkness.

 

During a series of protracted campaigns against a shadowy group known as the Vorian Liberators, the Proselytes were forced to murder thousands of people, time and again who they had thought loyal to the Imperium. The Liberators' were unlike the rebellions, mutant hordes and heretics the chapter had faced before in that they did not attack the chapter directly but somehow turned the people of several worlds  and colonies viciously against the Imperium. The chapter master was shaken by the sudden, massive outburst of heresy from the very people who lived faithfully for hundreds to thousands of years. It did not take long for the chapter's Librarium to realize that each world the Verdian Liberators had visited and corrupted, corresponded directly to worlds the chapter had brought the Imperial Creed to in the past. The chapter's faith held strong but sinister rumors began to circulate among the chapter fleet's personnel that the massacres were the result of everything from heretical leadership and unnecessary butchery perpetrated by the battle brethren of the chapter, to compensation for a terrible, damning secret held by the chapter's Librarium.

 

Despite the mounting rumors, the entire Reclusiam strove tirelessly to dissuade and quash these rumors by renewing faith in the Imperial Creed. Meanwhile the chapter master and chief librarian formulated a strategy to draw the Vorian Liberators out and crush their venomous efforts once and for all. After weeks of planning, the fleet mobilized and brought the full might of the chapter to bear across an entire system known as Telmudan. The chapter spent weeks more hunting the members of the Liberators through a hive city, ferrocyte mine, across a vast agri world and finally cornering the largest cell in the bowels of an old, neglected Ecclesiarchal complex.

 

 

[Conn Eremon]

A decent start, a fallen brotherhood sworn to the banner of a greater evil. Their history is fine, though I feel that a lot is directly stated that could be improved if approached more subtly.

 

At its most basic level, we have an Emperor-fearing Chapter proud in its dedication to bringing wayward worlds back into the God-Emperor's light. This pride turns into self-doubt as those very accomplishments begin to sour and corrupt into even worse reflections of their prior states.

 

That's an interesting history. But outing the Alpha Legion as the culprit, placing the blame at the feet of these Vorian Liberators, is a mistake I feel.

 

I think the article would be better served keeping the actual culprits in the dark, and not even declare that there is an outside agent. The Proselytes reclaim worlds, and instill their faith within the populations. Slowly and scattered, their faiths begin to be twisted into a darker shape, coalescing into an en masse revolt against the Imperium. With the Proselytes having such a powerful connection to these worlds, of course they try to intervene, and of course of the Imperium wonder at who is to blame. They wonder if the Proselytes themselves are responsible. After all, the heretics call out to them as if they were gods among flock.

 

I think that kind of set up would make for a more meaningful fall.