THE LIBER CLUSTER II

[Conn Eremon]

Hello, and welcome to the return of the Liber Cluster!  The Liber Cluster was a sandbox playground where anyone and everyone could insert new ideas, work with others in developing them, and grow the setting in new and novel ways. Any idea could go into the Liber Cluster; every aspect was open to development, from Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes, to regiments of the Imperial Guard, from Sisterhoods to Knight Houses, from Forge Worlds to Death Worlds.

 

The first thread of the Liber Cluster explored much of what led the Imperium to conquer it. Please take the time to read through the following posts, as it contains much of the collated lore from the previous thread. But don't worry, it's not a requirement to know everything created in the first thread. Myself and others who were involved in it can help you navigate the lore safely.

 

For now, I would like to go over some ground rules:

 

GOLDEN RULES

 

• First and foremost, this is a collaborative community project. Remember to be considerate and work together on concepts, even if you find out that others are working on the same concepts as you but have different ideas.

 

• Only new material can be introduced to the Liber Cluster. No volunteering old work, even if you modified it.

 

• Everyone is an equal contributor, whether providing comments and critique or creating new ideas.

 

• All contributions to this project are available to anyone to develop further within the project. You cannot claim exclusivity to your own ideas.

 

These rules are just here to remind us all what the point of this project is about. It is where anyone can hop in, at any point, and develop something of their own that will have a permanent place in a shared setting. There is no right way, there is no wrong way. We are not here to rate or approve content that meets our individual expectations. This is not the project where we simply state something doesn't work, but where we make our own additions that better accommodate and resolve conflict.

 

Some exceptions may apply as I deem it necessary, such as to keep the project on a path or to resolve conflict. As an example, later on I will begin to speak of a shady renegade faction that is beginning to become a true thorn in the Imperium's side. This renegade faction does have background that will be revealed, but is currently being kept hidden until after the initial assignment has concluded.

 

In all circumstances, such exceptions will be made with the intent of being inclusive of all contributors rather than exclusionary.

 

 

When you are caught up with the Liber Cluster’s lore, or if you are a veteran from the original thread, please see this post for your first assignment!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

INTRODUCING THE LIBER CLUSTER

 

The Liber Cluster is the furthest domain of the Imperium, existing just outside of the Milky Way galaxy around which it orbits. This globular cluster of stars is ancient, and may in fact be the remains of a dwarf galaxy long ago caught in the Milky Way’s gravitational pull. Nearly twenty thousand light years in diameter, it is in truth no further from Terra than other fringe worlds of the Ultima Segmentum. However, between Terra and the Liber Cluster lies only the empty void. More have died in the crossing than have ever reached the other side. And yet, it stands as testament to the pride and ingenuity of humanity. Six thousand years ago, an armada of unprecedented size reached out from across the black and took the Liber Cluster from the alien and the heretic, in the God-Emperor’s name.

 

The war of conquest lasted three centuries, and cost the Imperium dearly. Among the toll of the dead was the Sons of Calderon, first among the Liberite Chapters. Enemies of the Imperium were made in those days, the consequences of which can still be felt to this day. Consolidating power, The Liber Cluster was afforded a certain autonomy rarely seen among Imperial domains. Out of necessity for their severe isolation, the Cluster operated as a fully self-sufficient colony of the greater Imperium, though the reach of the Imperial Tithe and gaze of the Inquisition knows no limits.

 

It has been six thousand years since the Liber Cluster was brought fully into the Imperial fold. Though so far removed, the Liber Cluster was plagued by all the old perils as well as the new. The Warp grows tumultuous the closer to the center of the Cluster you reach, culminating in a perpetual warp storm that hides the true numbers of the great enemy. Though Humanity is a more recent arrival, the Orks and the Eldar have been here for an age or more, and many more xenos are native to the Cluster. Predation and betrayal were, as ever, hallmarks of Imperial reign. Wars and crusades were waged, and even mighty Space Marine Chapters fell.

 

The denizens of the Cluster have survived and flourished against all odds, but nothing will test them as what awaits them. It will be decades before the truth finds its way to the distant Cluster, but the fall of Cadia and the great scar upon the face of the galaxy had an immediate impact. From the center of the Cluster and the great warp storms within it comes an unending army of the damned and the profane, and now a terrible war is fought within the dense and cancerous core. Among these heretics are lieutenants of the Warmaster himself, though many others see the Liber Cluster as an opportunity to carve out their own domain.

 

Faith in the God-Emperor remained absolute, and salvation did come after decades of keeping the hordes at bay. Miracle of miracles, a son of the Emperor has been returned to life. By his command were enhanced Space Marines forged for war, and at his word sent across the Imperium. Soon after word came to the Liber Cluster, fleets began to appear bearing the manpower and gene-stock to replenish this beleaguered front line.

 

Though unknown pirates somehow managed to overpower and plunder many of these fleets just before they could fully cross the empty void, this influx was like a balm to the Liber Cluster. Thousands of Militarum regiments, alongside Mechanicus cohorts, Knight houses, and other symbols of the Imperium’s might marched to renew the war efforts. In addition, great stores of Adeptus Astartes gene-stock was imported to found new Chapters. Called the Liber Founding, an offshoot of the Ultima Founding, a dozen Space Marine Chapters were raised from these stores. These new Chapters were comprised of the new Primaris Space Marines, but due to piracy many of these Chapters had to utilize original Space Marine gene-lines to more quickly reach full strength.

 

However, the threat of Chaos is far from the only danger to the Imperium’s grip on the Liber Cluster. In investigating the sudden silences from the distant edge, Imperial authorities were outraged to find that entire systems, including vital forge worlds, had sworn fealty to a different master. Initial retaliations proved their new lords more than capable of defending their gains, as Primaris Space Marines bearing unknown heraldry and unsanctioned equipment struck back with unexpected force.

 

Later conflicts and continued investigation revealed some of the hidden orchestrators, as their domain continued to grow. Genetic testing on the remains of enemy combatants showed markers linking to stolen gene-stock. Impossibly, a renegade faction had not only stolen gene-seed but had the ability to cultivate and implant it. With such a powerful military backing, their efforts to dismantle Imperial authority posed an existential threat to the Emperor’s rule.

 

 

Three powerful forces vie for dominance over this distant and ancient cluster of stars: the loyal, the traitor and the renegade.

 

And its future is up to you…

 

 

 

 

Lore Index

 

Post 1: Rules / Intro / Index

 

Liberite Chapters

Post 2: Aetheric Swords

Post 3: All-Seers

Post 4: Black Falcons

Post 5: Black Judges

Post 6: Blades of the Lion

Post 7: Conflagrators

Post 8: Doomsayers

Post 9: Eagles of Glory

Post 10: Heralds of Letum

Post 11: Iron Ravagers

Post 12: Lords Inviolate

Post 13: Scarlet Sentinels

 

List of the Fallen

Post 14: Angels Exultant

Post 15: Blackjaw Kindred

Post 16: Sons of Calderon

 

Liber Cluster Domains

Post 17: Subsector Liber Regnum

Post 18: Subsector Centralis

Post 19: Subsector Colvin

Post 20: Subsector Englica

Post 21: Subsector Arrenthal

Post 22: Subsector Antipatris

Post 23: Subsector Sindhi

Post 24: Unclaimed Locales

 

Post 25: Notable Denizens

 

Space is reserved for newer lore introduced in this thread!

Edited March 24, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE AETHERIC SWORDS
"Our songs herald the end! We sing for the deaths of those who oppose Him on Terra!"

 

 

 

A Chapter viewed by others as highly unorthodox and superstitious, these fierce sons of Guilliman wage war in defence of the Liber Cluster. Named by the Emperor's Tarot, the Chapter dwells close to the edge of the Liber Cluster on the feral, deadly world of Grennarch.

 

The most notable aspect of the Chapter is their practice of broadcasting battle-hymns during battle, flooding all but a few vox channels with a thousand voices raised in songs of praise to the Emperor and of the damnation of his foes. Each battle brother adds his voice to the recorded hymns as part of their initiation into the Reserve Companies, singing the complex and interwoven melodies with their current kinsmen and the honoured dead alike. This is called the Undying Choir by the brothers of the Aetheric Swords.

 

The Chapter recruits primarily from the bold and sturdy tribesmen of Grennarch, and has adopted their customary practice of marking their armour with personalised dark blue heraldric warpaints, ranging from simple circles, lines and spirals to outlines of creatures, or sometimes sigils to represent notable kills or other victories.

 

The Aetheric Swords place great stock in their Librarians; they are considered to have a spiritual link to the Emperor, and their ability to read signs and portents is highly prized within the Chapter. Each Captain traditionally has a senior Librarian to act as an advisor, and in reality they can be something of a Company's éminence grise, leading the Company under the guise of merely advising. Librarians are attired in the Codex-approved fashion, but often with embellished white robes and hoods to signify their otherworldly connection to what the Chapter refers to as the 'Great Aether' - more commonly known as the Warp. The Chapter believes that one day the Emperor will rule there as he does in the material realm, and that it is the role of the Librarians to tame the Great Aether for the Emperor.

 

The Aetheric Swords place much importance on rituals - making the proper preparations before a battle to armour oneself both physically and spiritually for any hardships to come. The warpaint is the most obviously visible part of this, but pre-battle chants led by the Chaplains are also a notable aspect. They also have a tradition of treating all Imperial forces as equals, be they Guardsmen, Sisters of Battle, Servants of the Machine God, Inquisitors or brother Space Marines. Though this is primarily considered a noble trait, it sometimes rankles high-ranking allies who feel they are not being afforded due respect.

 

With regards to organisation, the Aetheric Swords are largely Codex-adherent, although veterancy is denoted in the chapter with intricately carved golden decorations worn on the shoulder instead of variant helmet colours or markings.

 

Combat practice largely limits the use of heavier tanks and artillery, preferring to fight enemies face-to-face in honourable combat over crushing them beneath the might of machines. A typical Aetheric Swords force consists mostly of rhinos loaded with infantry, supported with bikes, aircraft and assault marines for flank attacks or driving targets out of cover. Heavy tanks, Terminators and Dreadnoughts are all used sparingly, often saved for truly implacable foes or sieges

 

COMBAT DOCTRINE AND ORGANIZATION OF THE AETHERIC SWORDS 

"First blood to me."
Kirowan Dawnspear, Captain of the Aetheric Swords Fifth Company, after wounding a fellow officer with a halberd strike across his chest in sparring

Speed, mobility, and rapid reaction are the cornerstones of warfare as practiced by the Aetheric Swords Battle Companies. With the strains of the Undying Choir echoing around them, these zealous warriors sweep down upon the enemies of the Emperor, using Bikes, Land Speeders, and Assault Marines to scythe through the enemy lines, with battle honors being granted to anyone who manages to strike down a heretic or xenos warrior in the act of drawing his weapon.

Tactical squads are specially trained to embark and disembark from their Rhino transports at speed so they may support these wild charges with fusillades of bolter fire and elegant flurries of chainsword strikes, before withdrawing to their vehicle ans allowing it to bear them to the next target.

In these lightning onslaughts, the Undying Chorus itself becomes a weapon, the rising crescendos overawing enemies even as the Swords mow them down. 

It is a rare foe who can survive these murderously quick onslaughts, and an outside observer could be forgiven for assuming these shining lancers constitute the epitome of the Chapter's warriors.

"Last blood counts for more."
Macmorrogh Redhand of the Cauldron Born, after knocking the Captain of the Fifth unconscious with a single punch 

But should an enemy prove especially resilent, the Chapter's heavy weapons and artillery specialists are unleashed, with Terminators, Land Raider and Vindicator heavy tanks, and Dreadnaughts lumbering forward to crush anything that stands before them with implacable fury. These warriors, most of them giants even by Astartes standards, are also the Sword's experts in siege warfare, and Chapter lore claims that enemy hordes have faltered and broken before their bastions at the mere sound of their thunderous voices echoing the Chorus's refrain from the walls.

The three Battle Companies, the Eighth Assault echelon, and the Sixth Reserve all traditionally favor the first school of tactics, while the Ninth Devastators, Seventh Reserve, and the "Cauldron Born" elite of the First are adherents to the second.

Rivalries between the two contingents are common, with some claiming that the Chapter's Librarians encourage the emnity, either to motivate the warriors in striving to outdo one another...or to ensure they're too busy bickering with one another to question the dominance of their gifted brethren. 

 

If I may return to my assigned Chapter of Aetheric Swords for a second, on their Chapter beliefs we have:

1. Rites and rituals are important

2. WE ARE MANLY MEN WHO LIKE TO SING, IN BIG BLOCK CORDS AND FOUR PART HARMONIES!

3. The Librarians run the Chapter, but not openly. They also have their own ambitions, and will sometimes put the Swords in conflict with other Astartes to achieve them.

It's the last I'd like to grapple with. Why the secrecy? It isn't as if Librarian run Chapters are completely unknown (Silver Skull Prognosticars, the Blood Ravens).
If the Librarians don't want the fact that they run things known to the Imperium at large, it suggests that whatever this ambition is, it's something the other Astartes and Imperial institutions would frown on.

Ace has already mentioned that the Swords believe that the ultimate destiny of their Librarius is to pacify the Warp.

The obvious route would be to have them gathering up sorcerous lore, possibly even Chaos artifacts, in preparation for this task, but I'd rather go in a different direction.

Necrons. That is to say, ancient artifacts of unknown provenance that have a calming effect on the turbulent currents of the Aether.

These are a thing in 40k (the installation destroyed in The Serpent Beneath, the Nexus Arrangement Marduk chased for three books, and of course the Sothis Beacon).

Perhaps the Undying Chorus itself came about when a Librarian from the (at the time totally Codex compliant) Swords used his powers in the presence of such a relic, and instead of the usual tortured screaming heard the Warp as a harmonious melody?

However, his psychically blunt battle brothers destroyed 
the xenos device over his protests. And so he and his fellows set out to gain enough control over the Chapter that they could prevent a repeat of that incident.

Now the Librarius is the power behind the throne, and directs the Chapter gather both artifiacts and lore about them. 

Still frowned on by the Imperium, but not as likely to end with everyone sprouting spikes and tentacles as long as they keep things covert.

 

-=-=-=-= Excerpt from Imperial Record LC:AS #3744T2D =-=-=-=-

 

Chapter Master Nevine Wildblade, Heir of Vengetrix and leader of the Aetheric Swords

Chapter Master Wildblade is an exemplar of the values the Aetheric Swords hold most dear. He is utterly fearless and will actively lead his men from the front, even in the bloodiest of battles. He recognizes that power comes in may forms - be it a strong arm, a thick shield, the ability to command the Aether, or a thousand voices raised in praise of the Emperor. For even the smallest of things, such as the successful completion of a properly honoured and hallowed ritual beforehand, can tip the scales in the Imperium's favour.

 

As the Aetheric Swords' normal representative at the Liber Conclave, Wildblade has always been quick to seek action, and is always willing to commit his men to battle in the Emperor's name, no matter how seemingly undefeatable the foe. However, he is also known to be ill-tempered at times, and easily goaded by those who find Wildblade or his Chapter irksome.

 

Nevine Wildblade is a large man, even for a Space Marine, and seems to take a degree of pride in his barbaric appearance. He carries an ancient power sword, marked with a thunderbolt and Aquila emblem, and wears the Armour of Vengetrix: a suit of artificer armour, ornately decorated with numerous golden plates. Each of these plates is detailed with a network of intricate carvings, and studded with precious stones mined from the depths of Grennarch, which are said to gift the bearer with the strength of the dead. It is further embellished with a network of dark blue patterns painted all over the armour in accordance with tradition.

 

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE ALL-SEERS

“Force of Will”

 

 

21st founding Chapter assigned to the Liber Cluster. The All-Seers are not a codex adherent chapter, Librarians and Chaplains fill a Major role in command decisions .The Chapter works well with other Astartes if the Emperors tarot deems it so. There have been times when they have quit in the middle of a Battle. Which has not sat well with the Inquisition, REF: Planet R390 which is now the Chapter's Home World. The Planet was given to the Chapter by the High Lords over ruling the Inquisition.

 

Little is known on the Chapters practices and customs, what is known they were a fleet based Chapter before being assigned to permanent assignment to the Liber. Sources say the Marines are very insular and show disdain to non-Astartes.

 

The All-Seers Armour is seen to be covered in Runes and the Wearing of skull kill totems. Every Marine is seen wearing Swords and close combat attachments on their Bolters. The Chapter is equipped with the most recent Marks of Power Armour, but has only enough TDA for three Squads and for High Ranking Brothers.

 

Three Librarians and Chaplains form a Council on the direction the Chapter should take on matters of Warfare and present it to the Chapter Master their council is sage. IT is rare for him to ignore their council. Techmarines and Apothecaries roles are as in any other Chapter. The standard Company is 5 Tac, 3 Assault 2 Dev. Bikes and Landspeeders, the Tempest landspeeder is abundant.

 

R390 is to be considered a paradise to the humans that now live on the planet Deep Blue Oceans lush forests fertile plains high mountain peaks. You would think this planet has never seen war. Farming and fishing are the major industries some manufacturing. The Overlords of the planet have very little to do with the population. Only during the feast are any of the All-Seers are in attendence. The feast is a Blood Game for new blood into the Chapter. The Planet has an Orbital defense network and the three moons have listening stations. The local PDF is small compared to other Planets all of the Weaponry is manufactured on the nearest Mech - head planet

 

R390 was a Feral Ork planet every known trace of the Xenos was eradicated. But scouts have found traces of other Ork marks on the mountainous Continent on the far side of the planet.

 

Chapter Symbol - All seeing Eye over a Pyramid

 

Gene-seed

The All Seers are very insular in nature and do not tithe their geneseed. This is a sticking point with both the Inquisition and The Mechanicum. The All Seers care nothing for the opinions of others and keep their secrets closely guarded. Even though the Astartes Chapters of the Liber Cluster are said to all be from loyalist stock that has not gone through any tampering like many of the other ill fated 21st founding Chapters, it is suspected in some circles that origins of The All Seers are dubious in nature. Whatever the truth is The All Seers are not saying. To this end, a certain Hereticus Inquisitor by the name of Javier DuMonde has made it his mission to discover their true nature. It is his belief that The All Seers have turned from face of The Emperor and are now on a road to damnation. So far all of his attempts to learn the truth have come to nothing or have been thwarted by the Chapter. What he does know is that they seem to be on a quest to find something. 

 

Being a Chapter that is led by their Librarium, The All Seers draw suspicion from many of the other Astartes Chapters in the Liber Cluster. This is not lost on the Chapter but it is of little importance. They view their role in The Liber Cluster as one of utmost importance. The Chapter's Librarians all possess the power of precognition and it is this ability that is used to guide its actions. Upon coming to the Liber Cluster, Chief Librarian Galron "The Mystic" became struck with a vision. After locking himself in his quarters for three days he emerged with the direction the Chapter was to take. his visions told him of a priceless relic and an ancient alien evil that lay dormant on the Western fringe of The Cluster. Since then several other members of the Librarium have had similar visions sometimes even in the midst of battle. These premonitions are taken very seriously and have caused The All Seers to on occassion withdraw from an engagement or refuse participation. This has caused them to draw the ire of many.

 

Working closely with Librarium, the Chaplains are ever vigilant to have their finger on the pulse of the Chapter. Some Battle Brothers have a hard time coming to grips with what many see as an oftentimes deriliction of duty. It is at these times that the Chaplains will counsel the Marines by assuring them that the All Seers have a duty to The Emperor that takes precedence above all and that duty is to find the meaning of the Librarium's prognostications and to locate the Relic. Because to do so will mean the salvation of the entire Liber Cluster.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

The Black Falcons

 

 

The Black Falcons are a Chapter on the brink. On arrival to their home system they were set upon by a large fleet of Ork pirates. After a prolonged space battle, which saw many ship to ship boarding actions by both sides, they were victorious and the Ork fleet was scattered. But victory came at a great cost as the Black Falcons were reduced to below half strength. Many of the original command structure was lost as well as most of the veteran 1st Company. The reeling Chapter was resolute and vowed to rebuild in the face of overwhelming odds.

 

The Chapter made its home on a backwater feral world named Scythia and with the help of the Saneslau Mechanicum, established  their fortress monastery in the wreckage of the downed battlebarge Iron Talon. In the four centuries after losing contact with The Imperium, the original colonists devolved into feral tribes who make their homes in small villages clustered around the ruins of long dead xenos cities. None of the xenos technology remains only the husks of once magnificent structures taken over by jungle growth still stand as testament to the alien society. The Scythians are a superstitious people and only the bravest venture into the ruins for they believe the spirits of the xenos still roam there. Tribal warfare is common as space and resources are scarce. It is from these hardy people that the Black Falcons began to try and replenish their losses. Aspirants from the various tribes of Scythia must travel to one of the many ruins that dot the planet's surface and spend a week there surviving with nothing but a knife. Many vicious beasts and poisonous plants live in the jungles and those that return from the test with a piece of the ruins as proof are chosen for induction into the chapter. the Black Falcons maintain an aloof presence on Scythia contacting the populace only during the Time of Trials. The people of Scythia in turn view them as Angels of the Sky King(their name for The Emperor) who have been sent to take their best young warriors to fight by his side in The Battle for The Heavens

 

The Black Falcons are scions of Corax descended from the Revilers. As such they excel in stealth and hit and run tactics. They also practice the rapid insertion form of warfare that is used by their progenitors. This became instrumental in helping them rebuild as they were able to minimize their losses during any engagement in which they participated. It did not help their relations with Codex-compliant Chapters such as The Lords Inviolate and the Scarlet Sentinels who look upon their style of warfare with disdain. They have a particularly strong relationship with The Eagles of Glory. This is due to assistance given by them in the form of equipment and supplies during the early stages of the Black Falcon's rebuilding process. And on more than one occasion Black Falcons squads that had spent weeks behind enemy lines were able to complete their missions due to the timely application of overwhelming firepower by The Eagles of Glory. The Black Falcons have not forgotten this and work with them whenever possible.

 

The Black Falcons are now at around three quarter strength. They still maintain the style of battle favored by their genesires. They have a relatively good relationship with the Saneslau Mechanicum and have assisted them in recovering equipment and materials lost during the first colonization of the Liber Cluster. The 4th Company under the command of Captain Samuel Therrien are currently investigating reports of cult activity in the nearby Thravian System. Contact was lost and the Chapter has sent elements of the 1st and 6th to ascertain their status.

 

The header did not come out the way I thought it would.

 

Organization:

Due to recent losses of manpower but the support of the Eagles of Glory in the form of war material, the Black Falcons have reorganized their companies significantly from standard codex compliance. Thanks to the Eagles’ support, the Black Falcons are very well armed, even though they have few veterans. This has led to the allowance of non veterans to use tactical dreadnought armour in combat and the formation of a tank company. The few remaining members of the first company have been split up amongst the 8 companies the Black Falcons now maintain.

 

The 2nd through 6th companies that make up the 5 battle companies now include 3 scout squads, 3 assault squads, 3 tactical squads, and 1 devastator squad. The 1st company contains 3 Terminator squads, 5 devastator squads, and 2 assault squads often heavily armed. The 7th company is a tank company consisting of roughly 50 space marines including the chapter’s techmarines. The 8th company is a scout company and functions similarly to the 10th company of many more conventional chapters. The 1st and 7th companies are often fielded separately and dispersed amongst the 5 battle companies, but some occasions warrant their deployment on the battlefield as a unit. One such occasion saw the 7th company fielded alone as a unit of razorbacks, vindicators, and predators storming across the fields of Parcath through a series of Necron fortifications. This event earned them the moniker of the “Linebreaker” company.

 

Beliefs:

    The large number of recruits the chapter has needed to take in during such a short period of time has resulted in several aspects of Scythian culture working their way into the chapter. Foremost perhaps, the Emperor is often referred to as the Sky King, even though all the recruits are taught the ‘truth’ about him. Furthermore, the newest Black Falcons have taken to wearing the ruined xenos tech and knives used in their recruitment as talismans. They are often affixed to armour as a ward against alien interference. These changes have lead to a division between the older marines and the new. So far this division has not lead to many difficulties, but as the percentage of battle brothers subscribing to the new belief structure increases, it remains to be seen whether these differences will strengthen the chapter through flexibility or weaken it through infighting.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE BLACK JUDGES

"The guilty were always once innocent"

 

 

Among the Imperial forces operating in the Liber Sector, the Black Judges are ones of the Chapters that earned a dire reputation for their cold effectiveness and their ruthless treatment of the Imperium’s enemies and citizens alike. Indeed, their unusual behavior, even for members of the Adeptus Astartes, has led some to speculate that their assignment to the Liber Sector has been taken as a precautionary measure to keep them away from the Imperium at large.

 

Highly secretive and distant from other Chapters, they dutifully enforce the supremacy of the Imperium through brutal shock attacks in the cover of the night that leave their targets always almost entirely devastated save for a few survivors. It is not out of mercy that the Black Judges keep these poor souls alike, but so they can spread the story of the assaults.

 

While zealous prosecution of the Imperium’s threats is usually highly praised, the Black Judges direct their wrath indiscriminately towards xenos, heretics and citizens at the least amount of suspicion of treachery or heretical behavior. Squads or even lone Black Judges regularly conduct secret investigations on suspected threats, creeping and watching at night over their prey, in search for the least sign of deviance. When they finally find it, or if proof is lacking but suspicion is high, they pounce unseen from the shadows and unleash punishing volleys of boltgun fire or rip their targets apart with the chainswords. They will often knock their weapons together before and during a fight in complete darkness or babble strange sounds, and it is rumored that their gene-seed has mutated to provide them some minor echolocation capability.

 

When purging xenos, they will often spend long periods, sometimes months, observing their targets from the darkness, until the moment at which they can cause the maximum physical and psychological devastation arise. At that moment, they will unleash the full might of their so-called “Prosecution Campaigns” and will obliterate the foe’s morale and ability to sustain the fight.

 

This effective tactic has been caused for concern amongst the other Liberites Chapters, mainly because more and more reports have come from both fringe and central worlds of lone survivors from utterly devastated settlements telling the story of black clad armored giants seemingly appearing out of nowhere and laying waste to everything and everyone they saw. While the Black Judges seek to maintain order at all costs through fear, this perception is not shared by other members of the Imperial Adepti present in the Liber Sector.

 

Their livery is of a dark royal blue on their limbs underlying the gleaming pitch-black armour of their upper body. Each Black Judge wears a large night-black cape in order to better conceal their features when investigating or before an assault, and when the red of their eye lenses and Aquila is finally revealed, it is often the last thing a person will see. They are a fleet based chapter, always roaming in the darkest interplanetary voids of the Liber Sector. Although it is still unconfirmed as of yet, they appear to be recruiting by abducting prospective candidate and letting them fight amongst others, the Trial by Trial, to decide the ones righteous enough to join their rank as evidenced by the highest disappearances rates throughout the Sector recorded after particularly exhausting engagements involving the Black Judges.

 

The Black Judges strongly believe that everyone is guilty of a crime against the Imperium. If no proof is found, it is either that the individual is a particularly adept at covering his devious tracks, or that the crime is only moments from being committed. Reports of missing Astartes squads in operational theatres close to Black Judges operations have aroused suspicion against them, but the Black Judges are being tolerated for the efficiency at which they break the enemies’ ability to fight back in joint campaigns… for now.

 

 

The Gene Seed of the Black Judges

Of all the mysteries surrounding the Black Judges, the most intriguing is that of their Gene Seed. Tithes have long been ignored, and with the Chapter roaming the void at will Imperial authorities have found it impossible to take the secretive Chapter to task. What few samples have been salvaged from dead Judges over the millennia suggest they descend from the line of Corax, however the variances in genetic data have led to conflicting reports ranging from the speculation of other gene-lineage to accusations of deliberately leaving dead brothers from other Chapters dressed in Black Judge colours. Of particular note is a discredited report from Inquisitor Garian Ordone, submitted in M39, claiming the genetic markers implicated the Judges as little more than heretics. The file, suppressed and hidden away, lies forgotten to all be the most resourceful of Imperial servants.

 

Black Judges almost never remove their helms, at least in the company of others, so it is difficult to substantiate the Raven Guard lineage that is suspected with visual investigation. It is also difficult to pry the information by data-mining, as all of the oldest sources regarding the Black Judges are missing significant tracts and passages. Consensus on the matter believes it is the work of the Black Judges themselves, or agencies in league with them, that has led to such important knowledge going missing. 

 

Direct confrontation on the subject is a rare and fruitless occurrence, as every Black Judge subjected to questioning refuses to speak of the Chapter and often escapes or dies in the attempt, careful to leave as little as possible for examination post-mortem. With investigation thwarted at almost every turn, little wonder then is it that the Black Judges are swathed in rumour and enigmatic speculation. This suits the Chapter fine for they are judged on what they do, not what they are.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

BLADES OF THE LION

 

 

SUMMARY: 
▪ GENE-SEED (PREDECESSOR) – Dark Angels
▪ FOUNDING - 21st "Cursed" Founding
▪ CHAPTER MASTER - Jurn Reven-Wold
▪ CHAPTER WORLD – NONE (Fleet Based)
▪ FORTRESS MONASTERY - Battle Barge "Legacy of the First"
▪ MAIN COLOURS – Gray and Bone
▪ SPECIALITY - Quick Strike Force
▪ BATTLE CRY – “Unsheath the Blades!” Response – “And Let the Lions Roar!”
▪ CURRENT STRENGTH - 786
▪ KNOWN DESCENDANTS - None
  
ORIGINS:
The Blades of the Lion are a crusading, fleet based Chapter currently located in the Liber Cluster. The Blades are Dark Angels successors from an ancient founding who prefer to fight alone which has almost doomed them several times since they were created, they are prideful and will never ask for assistance even if they know they are doomed. Without a homeworld the Blades roam the Cluster in their Strike Cruisers attacking pirate and xenos strongholds wherever they find them, either dropping from the skies in drop pods or tearing through enemy ships in brutal boarding actions. Their leaders are master tacticians and take pride in surrounding the enemy and seeing utterly annihilated. The Chapter has a history of battling Orks in the Liber Cluster, matching the prowess of their bike mounted warriors against the Ork mechanized hordes but it is against Traitor Space Marines that the Blades fight the fiercest. The Blades are able to fully test their mettle when fighting foes comparable to themselves and relish believing themselves to be utterly superior to anything that isn’t a Space Marine.
 
To outsiders, the Blades of the Lion appear to strike at random then disappear into the void afterwards but in reality they are being guided by their Librarians who believe they are receiving visions from their Primarch in pursuit of the “Great Hunt”. Their Chaplains work alongside the Librarians in deciphering the visions and interrogating prisoners to find their next target. It is unfortunate if any of these visions strike during a battle as the Blades may suddenly redeploy before their quarry escapes – this makes the Blades a sometimes-unreliable asset in a large campaign but if they have the numbers they will endeavor to leave some marines behind so their allies are not overwhelmed.
 
The Blades will recruit from wherever they can, the Cluster is large enough for them to have plenty of recruiting worlds to choose from but they do not lay claim to any specifically. Once an initiate is taken in they are mind wiped and they will only know the Chapter. The “Great Hunt” is known by all of the Blades but only the high ranking marines know exactly what the Hunt is actually trying to achieve, the commanders know that the targets they hunt are the forever cursed Fallen. The rest of the Blades believe they are hunting traitors to the Emperor and are not aware that their targets were once or are still Dark Angel Legionnaires.
 
The Blades of the Lion are not trusted by most of the Liberite Chapters due to their isolationist attitude and tendencies to withdraw from combat without a word. The Blades rarely attend a Liberite Conclave but when they do their words are seldom ignored when planning assaults yet they will never offer themselves to be the lynchpin of a campaign, the risk of duty to the Imperium and the secret shame of the Great Hunt could spell disaster.
 

FLEET ASSETS:
The Blades of the Lion can lay claim to a fairly considerable fleet of ships. Though they have only a limited number of Strike Cruisers and Battle Barges, Chapter Serfs are billeted in a flotilla of smaller, purely non-combat ships that accompany the Blades' vessels like squires attending to a noble knight. 

 

Battle Barge "Legacy of the First" - An ancient vessel with its origins dating back to the Great Crusade. The vessel was thought to have been destroyed by the Night Lords in the running battles between the two primarchs and their legions. The Blades encountered the remnants of the vessel and realized that the vessel was not only salvageable but nearly battle ready with full complements of weapons and equipment. After honoring the fallen brothers still aboard the vessel, the Techmarines set to work to repair the damage done by the Night Lords. Within a Terran year, the vessel was back to full operation and with the discovery of chamber that bore signs that the Lion had spent time aboard the vessel, it was made the flagship of the Blades. With the chamber treated like a shrine to the Lion, the Blades are confident that the vessel will see them to victory into the far future.

 

Strike Cruiser "Wings of Caliban" - acts as a recruitment vessel for the Blades, constantly scouring the worlds of the Liber Cluster for worthy recruits.

 

Other notable vessels:

The Bladed Trophy

The Lion's Lodge

The Bladed Blind

The Relentless/Restless Hunter

The Calibanite Snare

The Path of Virtue

The Inescapable Hunter

The Herald of Honour

The Oath of Vengeance

The Merciless Wrath

The Lion's Roar

The Pride

 
PRESENT ACTIVITIES:
The Blades of the Lion are Currently active in the Liber Cluster in pursuit of the “Great Hunt.” The Blades rarely attend a Liberite Conclave but when they do their words are seldom ignored when planning assaults yet they will never offer themselves to be the lynchpin of a campaign, the risk of duty to the Imperium and the secret shame of the Great Hunt could spell disaster.
 
BATTLE HONORS:
The Blades of the Lion have taken part is innumerable conflicts in the furthest reaches of the Liber Cluster. While tales of the Great Hunt are confined strictly to the innermost vaults of this secretive Chapter, there are no shortage of glorious battles the Blades of the Lion have partaken in.

During the early years of the Liber Cluster, the Blades of the Lion were notable participants in the Eighteen Worlds Crusade, a bitter, gruelling war waged against a gang of renegade Astartes known as the Sereiki Lions.

Perhaps viewing the renegades' choice of name as a personal affront to all scions of the First Legion, the Blades of the Lion took several opportunities to strike at these foes alongside their brother Chapters, notably taking an active part in the purging of Heroda IV alongside the Black Judges and working alongside the Iron Ravagers in the Pacification of Tonagish.

Under the guidance of the Lion's Eye, however, The Blades of the Lion also turned to more covert actions, seeking to ascertain the true nature of the leaders of this warband. Thus, the Chapter's Reserve Companies found themselves being carefully deployed away from the primary battlefronts, fighting several low-key engagements at remote outposts to starve the traitors of valuable intelligence reports, isolate key figures in the enemy's leadership chain, or deprive the foe of useful resources such as recruitment grounds. Though the exact details of these missions have not yet come to light, the few outsiders that know of them simply see it as the Blades working hard to serve the Imperium.

Equally, the Blades of the Lion found themselves much involved in the Inquisition's 'shadow war' against the secretive, anti-Imperial organisation known as Penumbra. Shadows, secrets and lies are in many ways familiar to the Unforgiven, and the Blades of the Lion were skilled at seeing through the ruses and schemes Penumbra used to veil their presence.

Though much of the details of the Blades' participation in this conflict is either lost to time or deliberately erased, their willingness to lend aid earned the Blades of the Lion not only much goodwill from local Inquisitors, but saw a great many Penumbra operatives detained aboard the Chapter's Fleet, at the leisure of the Inner Circle.

The Blades of the Lion have also been at the forefront of combat against traitor marines over the centuries - taking action against rogue elements of the Blackjaw Kindred during the Burning Brothers Schism and clashing with the Black Legion and their minions during the events known as the Shadow Marches. Of particular note were the Blades' actions against the traitorous Angels Exultant chapter during the March of Ghosts, when the Unyielding Hate and the company of marines on board managed to destroy several times their own number even when confronted with the haunting spectres of their own dead obfuscating the enemy. For their actions during this battle, their leader was posthumously granted the Liber Falx by the Council, which has been handed down within the third company ever since.

More recently, the Blades have fought alongside the Scarlet Sentinels and Lords Inviolate against the seemingly-inexorable traitor horde known as the Ghoulknights of Throskaar, and their ninth Company was amongst those who made a desperate stand at Scythia against Waaagh Roksmasha. In each of these conflicts, the Blades of the Lion remained stoic, steadfast and resolute to their duty, demonstrating honour and valour worthy of the Lion himself.
 
CHAPTER ORGANIZATION:
The Blades of the Lion are, in many ways, built on honour and tradition. In few places is this more evident than within the Chapter's organisational structure. Like most Dark Angel successors, the Blades are broadly compliant with the layout advised by the Codex Astartes - ten companies, each a hundred Space Marines strong. It is only on a closer examination that the differences within that organisation become apparent.
 
Scouts, for example, are not permitted to bear the Chapter's full heraldry; they are instead given plain grey armour with bone pauldrons - enough colour to serve as an identifier of allegiance to the Chapter, but still visually distinct from true Battle-brothers of the Chapter.
 
Librarians are held in high regard within the Chapter. Their master of the Librarium is sometimes referred to as the Lion's Eye, for it is his counsel that guides the Blades in the Great Hunt. The Lion's Eye is given a very high level of respect, and in terms of authority is considered to rank only just below a Company Captain.
 
Amongst the rest of the Chapter, the First Company is informally known as the "Kingslayers", for their first campaign in the Liber Cluster saw them destroy a traitor marine known as 'Parsiel, King of Exiles' and his armies. As with the Dark Angels and many of their kin, the First Company is the exclusive home of the Chapter's Tactical Dreadnought Armour. Unlike other scions of Jonson, however, the sheer remoteness of the Liber Cluster from the rest of the Imperium means the Blades of the Lion only have enough functional suits to field three full squads of Terminators. The rest of the "Kingslayer" Company are made up of veteran marines, much like any other Codex Chapter.
 
The Second Company is almost entirely given over to the use of bikes and landspeeders, and is treated with very much the same respect and deference that the First Company is given. The Second Company is the Chapter's most formidable weapon in the Great Hunt - most frequently deployed as demi-companies alongside other Blades forces, they excel in pursuing and ensnaring fleeing enemies, forcing them to face destruction or capture.
 
The Blades of the Lion also field three conventional Battle Companies and four codex-approved Reserve Companies, each steeped in proud traditions. In true Dark Angel fashion, only the upper echelons of each Company are aware of the true nature of the Great Hunt, with the truth concealed by layer upon layer of secrecy and careful misdirection.

 
RECRUITMENT:
The Blades have been known to recruit from all manner of worlds - factory worlds, feudal worlds, even death worlds. If there is a set pattern to their choice of recruitment worlds, it is known only to the upper echelons of the Chapter. However, one interesting trend is that efforts to find viable recruits always seems to increase in intensity prior to the Blades embarking on the Great Hunt, leading to outsider speculation that perhaps the Chapter's Librarians have some say in where the Wings of Caliban travels.
 
CHAPTER COLORS:
The Chapter has kept its standard bone and gray color scheme since its founding through all of its companies. There are two areas of difference in the scheme. First is that the Kingslayers have bone in place of the gray on their Terminator armor similar to the Deathwing of the Dark Angels Chapter. The second is that the Scouts have their armor mostly painted gray save for the cauldrons which are the only areas painted bone. To an outsider, there is nothing significant to this scheme. But within the Chapter, the bone signifies their devotion to the Great Hunt even if the object of their Hunt varies. As the Kingslayers have more of the full knowledge behind the Great Hunt, they show more bone in their armor whereas the scouts know hardly anything. 

 

The only other area of deviation is in the specialists of the chapter. Each Specialist has taken up the traditional look of coloring their entire armor to match their specialization. In this way, they symbolize to their brothers that they have left the Great Hunt to follow the path of their specialization.

 

 
BATTLE STANDARDS OR CHAPTER BANNERS (OPTIONAL):

 

 

BATTLE HONORS/RELICS/DECORATIONS/AWARDS:
The Heavenfall Blades:
Each of the chapters descended from the Dark Angels are said to have a small portion of the obsidian meteor, which was used to forge the Heavenfall Blades so that they too might share through steel the legacy of their founders. Many legends surround Harbinger, a sword wielded by high-ranking members of the Blades of the Lion, but at the very least, we know that it is one of these such weapons.
 
Harbinger is a finely wrought power sword with a large red gem in the center of its cross guard. In addition, built into its hilt is a locator beacon. It is said that the sword often begins to hum and the red gem glows when danger is present, but whether this is just the result of the prudent wielder activating its internal beacon or some gift from the Emperor himself the Blades have never commented on.
 
COMBAT DOCTRINE:
There is little, in theory, to set the Blades of the Lion apart from other sons of the Lion once they are deployed on the field of battle. Enemies are met with an advancing, unstoppable force of Space Marines who adapt to any combat situation effortlessly, shrugging off enemy attacks and retaliating with punishing force. However, there are a few subtle quirks that make the Blades noteworthy.
 
The Blades set high value by facing down an enemy in honourable combat, but such honour is usually reserved for only the most veteran squads within a company. Squads of 'lesser standing' in a company are more usually tasked with the more mundane aspects of combat, such as flanking movements or intercepting enemy ambushes, leaving the way clear for the veterans to engage the enemy's strongest forces. Although it is unheard of for a squad of the Blades to directly disobey orders from their Captains, it is quite commonplace for squads of lesser standing to undertake acts of quite singular bravery and heroism on their own initiative to prove their worth and valour to the rest of the Company.
 
Another notable factor is that any Blades involved with the Great Hunt shed this seemingly ingrained competitive nature entirely. When the Hunt is on, the Blades shun personal honour completely, caring only for the larger victory, which will bring honour and pride to their Primarch and all their kindred.
 
BATTLE CRY:
“Unsheath the Blades!” Response – “And Let the Lions Roar!”
 
LOCAL RITUALS:
Tests of the Lion
 A tournament held within the chapter, the Tests of the Lion is a series of challenges held throughout the chapter, testing each marines skill with his guns, blades and strategic values. First the marine must face his brothers in his squad before progressing to facing the companies victors before finally facing the rest of the chapters victors. It is a usual sight for the challenges involving other companies to be held during the times where the chapter meets up. 
 
The most recent victor of the Tests, Valdos Tarroc of the Fourth Company, is has most recently been labeled as MIA after encounters with the Dark Eldar. If he is still alive, it is most likely he has been thrown into the arenas, to fight to his death.
 
BELIEFS:

"By what right does the wolf judge the Lion? By what creed can we be judged, save for our own?" - Brother Hastoc Daland's address to the Liber Conclave

 

The Blades of the Lion are, at their heart, a Chapter driven by dual obsessions. Firstly, the Blades are utterly dedicated to the cultivation and preservation of their Chapter's honour, and secondly, they are entirely devoted to the ceaseless pursuit and extermination of the Fallen; considered perhaps the only thing that can truly undermine the honour of not only the Chapter, but of all scions of Lion El'Jonson. 

 

Arguably, the Chapter's focus on honour and tradition is as much a guise to mask the true nature of the Great Hunt even within the Chapter as it is a way of life for the Chapter - very few Blades throughout the Chapter's storied history have been willing to defy deeply ingrained traditions for the sake of questioning their superiors or their motives.

 

The Chapter views the Emperor as the very pinnacle of nobility - matchless in battle, possessed of peerless wisdom and pure in both words and deeds. They fervently believe the Dark Angels - first amongst the Legions - were the Emperor's chosen, His finest creations, suffering from none of the inherent flaws of the other Legions. They see their Primarch, and thus themselves, as the true inheritors of The Emperor's greatness.

 

This, coupled with the Chapter's impressive list of victories in key battles in the Liber Cluster, has given the Blades of the Lion an overwhelming sense of pride. Indeed, the Chapter's pride in it's collective honour can at times give the Blades of the Lion an arrogant, sneering demeanour. However, every shred of that honour has been hard-won on the field of battle, and those few foolish enough to provoke a Blade into defending that honour quickly learn that their pride, though overbearing at times, is not misplaced. Their operation within the Liber Cluster is also seen as a special honour they share with no other son of the Lion, taking the spirit of the First to the furthest edge of the Imperium.

 

Even when dealing with other Chapters, there are few outside of the lineage of Jonson that the Blades of the Lion truly treat as equals. The Blades' respect must always be earned, and is never given easily. Even amongst the very limited number the Chapter shows any deference to, the Blades are always somewhat distant, constantly gauging how much others know or suspect of their secrets.

 
GENE-SEED:
Dark Angels
 
CHAMPIONS OF THE CHAPTER:
Brother Javin Gildred, Sworn Champion of the 2nd Company:
When the Great Hunt locates one of the Fallen in the Liber Cluster, the Second Company is the Chapter's first choice to intercept the traitor. Within that company, the task of facing down an armed, dangerous Fallen is almost always given over to their Company Champion, Javin Gildred.
 
Gildred is a hardened, merciless fighter, skilled in all forms of combat. While most of the Chapter believe Gildred always slays the Hunted, the truth of the matter is that he always leaves them barely alive, that the Chaplains and Chapter Master may set the captured Fallen on the path of repentance.
 
Gildred seems to harbour an especially strong hate of the Fallen, even for one of Jonson's sons. He treats the existence of the Fallen as a stain on his personal honour as well as on the entirety of Jonson's line.

 
Interrogator Urvin Thaen, Chaplain of the 5th Company:
A renowned breaker of men, Chaplain Thaen has brought five Fallen to the point of confession over his long life. Now in his fourth century, soon to be his fifth, the white haired astartes has seen captains and chapter masters come and go. But, for Thaen, it is not officers he is duty bound to. It is the Great Hunt. Eschewing the rank of Grand Master no less than four times, Thaen has poured his soul into his work. Many find him curt to the point of being rude and often find that he will wait for no man. This impatience has always been a trait of Thaen, which could also explain his methodology during interrogations. 
 
Not a particularly inspiring orator, Thaen will usually lead by example rather than attempt to inspire his brothers to greater acts in battle. Due his age and experience, Thaen is often treated as a tactical advisor. As any battle brother, he can handle himself on the battlefield - this does not make him special. What does, however, is his foresight. Thaen knows when particular enemies would choose to attack, when they would choose to defend and how they do so. Xenos hold no surprises for him and traitors find themselves cut down in an untimely fashion facing the interrogator. 
 
Thaen, as he proudly boasts to all who listen, takes special relish killing astartes of any stripe. Draw a blade or bolter against him and, as he always assures the listener, you won't be standing for long. Contemptuous, cantankerous and blunt, Urvin Thaen thrives on hatred.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE CONFLAGRATORS

http://i.imgur.com/Jh8w0Gj.jpg

“Purity by fire!”

+Standard Battle Brother of the Conflagrators+

Overview

+Veteran Kindleus of the First Company, art by Blazbaros.+

O

n the verge of censure for many centuries, the Conflagrators often disregard collateral damage when prosecuting an assault - especially when fire is involved. The use of flame weaponry is common amongst Astartes of the Conflagrators - veterans notably bearing them at every given opportunity. Flame motifs are also common in the Conflagrators, varying from small icons to alterations to the heraldry borne on a brother's battle plate.

Created from Salamander gene-seed, the Conflagrators take an uncanny pleasure at watching flames, utilising them for ceremonies and warfare with aplomb. Woe betide any enemy captured by a Conflagrator for they are known to burn their prisoners at the stake. Bearing little resemblance to their primogenitors besides their love of the flame, the Chapter owes more of it's culture to its homeworld than it's parent Chapter.

The world that the Conflagrators call home is an industrialised planet with theocratic rulers. Named Cardinalis, it was settled by a colony convoy bearing devotees of the Red Redemption during the first wave of colonisers. Little wonder it is that the Chapter is itself highly religious in comparison to other Chapters. They perceive the Emperor as divine and care naught for other interpretations of Him. Of their interactions with the natives of Cardinalis, the Conflagrators select appropriate candidates for gene-seed implantation and take their leave. They often choose to have nothing more to do with these faithful, preferring to maintain solitude within their fortress monastery.

Although the Chapter can be the most steadfast of allies, many relationships with other Imperial agencies - and indeed other Chapters - are bitter with acrimony and resentment. For some, it is because of the mercurial, arrogant attitude they have, for others it is the disregard they hold for orders issued by any other than an Astartes. The few they do consider friend are backed to the hilt when the need arises. They do not forget allies easily.

Of all the Liberite Chapters, the Conflagrators are one of the least liked. They have rarely been considered for theatre command if other options are available. This has gone down badly with the chapter at large and they often only attend Liberite Conclaves out of duty and nothing else. A typical Conflagrator is pious and sincere but they also tend to be bitter and intractable. This brittle nature handled correctly can bring a powerful vanguard force to an Imperial army.

Organisation

Defenders of the Nikaea Edict

Much like other notable Chapters, the Conflagrators still adhere to the Nikaea Edict, laid down during the Great Crusade. Thus the Chapter does not recruit psykers and therefore has no Librarius. In its absence the Chaplains of the Chapter have taken on the duty of maintaining the Chapter's data-vaults, and vigorously strive not only to maintain the spiritual purity of the Chapter but also work to weed out brothers who exhibit nascent powers for whatever reason. Those that are found to be impure face one of two fates - either the indignity of lobotomisation and servitude or the abrupt and succinct bolt round to the skull.

A

s with much of the Conflagrators' thinking, the Chapter's organisation leans toward orthodoxy, holding the Codex Astartes in reasonably high regard. They have the usual ten companies and the usual disposition amongst their brotherhood. However, the Chapter does not have a Librarius and has an instituted system of loyalty and faith, with members of this system known as 'the Devoted'.

In truth the Conflagrators owe little of their character to their primogenitors - the Salamanders. They do not share the more humanitarian aspects of the Salamanders' demeanour nor do they tolerate psykers beyond navigators and astropaths, and even these necessary evils are barely countenanced. Short of genetic heritage, an outside observer could be forgiven for believing the Chapter comes from different stock. It is interesting to note, however, the curious similarity of a Chapter Cult. Where the Salamanders have the Promethean Cult, the Conflagrators have 'the Devoted'.

Being a Chapter that adheres to Imperial Creed very closely, even fanatically at times, and recruiting from pious stock means that particular emphasis on faith and zeal permeate the strata of the Chapter. From the lowliest menials to the Chapter Master himself, all are required to make observances to the God-Emperor of mankind. As an extension of this, any of the Chapter - astartes or otherwise - can be inducted into the Devoted if they demonstrate particular piety. Once a member of the Cult, the adherents of the Creed take on the suffix 'Devotee' in addition to their official title or rank. The Chapter Master must formally eschew the suffix - he is seen as the lord and master of the Chapter, and therefore the Devoted also. To ascribe him to the Cult would be superfluous. The same is usually said of all of the senior command echelon - the High Reclusiarch and Chief Apothecary are expected to dispose of such ties.

Membership in the Devoted generally takes the form of a branding, typically on the chest or the face. The symbol itself has varied over time but in modern usage the Imperial Aquila super-imposed on a ball of flame is the official marking within the Cult. Further brandings are treated as marks of honour, for those that truly test their faith and prevail. Outward appearances on the battlefield usually take the form of symbolic white flames and aquilas over traditionally orange armour, braziers and censors adorning the Devotee and, for some, lengths of chain to represent the ties that bind them to the Emperor Himself. To the lay man, a Conflagrator brother appearing mostly in white and bearing tokens of creed is expected to be looked upon with reverence and pride for he is a living embodiment of worship and war.

The hallmarks of fanaticism are rife within the Devoted, as to be expected. Wounds are common with self-flagellation perhaps being the most common cause. Other known self-mutilations by the Devoted include scourging and scarification. It is often seen as a means to deny prideful urges or penitence for infractions, genuine or otherwise. The use of these practises are common and not hidden from anyone.

Within the Chapter itself, being a member of the Devoted does not officially influence personal standing, nor does it confer any special privileges. Unofficially, it does exactly that. Devoted members of the Conflagrators generally tend to be more outspoken than their uninitiated brethren and more likely to associate with fellow Devoted. This in turn lends the Devoted a strong say in many matters, from strategy to diplomacy (such as it is with the Conflagrators). Even when new Captains and Chapter Masters are 'impartially' chosen by the Chaplains, there have been times when piety has trumped skill, when zeal outweighed experience. One such example is Lord Hellfyre, second Chapter Master of the Conflagrators, who was selected for exactly those reasons. He had proven able as commander of the Conflagrators but ill-suited to the politics of the Liber Cluster. A more shrewd individual could have mitigated this flaw, had one been chosen.

Although the Devoted have often waxed strong within the Conflagrators, there's been occasions when they've been diminished by war or fallen out of favour in some way. These fallow periods vexed remaining Cult members, though much of the time their responses to such crises for the Devoted have been to pray, attend pilgrimages and even induct more moderate brothers in an effort to polarise their views. Sometimes this has worked, sometimes it has not. That the Cult has survived the millennia tells of the lengths the members of it have gone to in order to keep it alive.

Combat Doctrine (Contributed in part by Reyner)

" The ashen face"

As a consequence of their rituals and beliefs, many Conflagrators mark their faces before battle with charcoal or ash or pitch. Going into battle with an 'ashen face' is considered to be standard practice - not only do the individual Conflagrators embrace their pyromaniacal nature doing this, but they can use these ashen faces to intimidate their foes and present a somewhat devilish front when coupled with their crimson eyes.

T

he Conflagrators make heavy use of flame weaponry in their assaults and it is seen as the only true path to purity for heretics and aliens alike – the Chapter is fascinated by flame and they do not care what burns so long as their pyromaniacal bent is sated. The marines advance behind a wall of fire when they assault an enemy, chanting their litanies as they march relentlessly through the ashes of their foes. A common assault formation of the Conflagrators is a spearhead of Land Raider Redeemers occupied by Sternguard and Tactical Terminator squads – this heavily armoured strike can smash through any obstacle and burn their way through entire cities, not caring what collateral damage is inflicted in the slightest. Other Imperial forces cannot fault the Chapter for their zeal in persecuting the foes of the Imperium but their incendiary tendencies rarely leave anything left for use. Entire industrial continents have been burned to slag and ashes in the aftermath of a Conflagrators assault.

Also of note is the relative simplicity of the Conflagrators' battle plans. This is not to say that they are unprepared in the event of unforeseen consequences but that the usual response boils down to burning, slaying and praying. The Chapter's zealotry contributes well to assault and close quarters combat, as does the propensity to field flamers. It is usually not in their nature to smash armour with heavy weaponry like lascannons or grav cannons but to close with the vehicle and employ close range strikes with meltas, power fists and the like.

Geneseed

A

s descendants of the Salamanders, the Conflagrators have inherited one particular trait - their burning, red eyes. Although they do not exhibit the usual charcoal skin of their primogenitors, their eyes just as psychologically intimidating as the tactics they regularly use. To stare down a Conflagrator takes a distinct and tremendous amount of willpower, given the attitude most Conflagrators have.

The Glade of Cinders (Contributed by SanguiniusReborn)

D

eep beneath the Conflagrators' Fortress-Monastery lies perhaps the Chapter's holiest site, the Glade of Cinders. A vast artificial cavern built into the very bedrock of Cardinalis, the Glade is a vast cemetery filled with pyrophyte plant life, fiery braziers and marble plinths upon which sit the urns that contain the Chapter's hallowed dead, an infernal Elysium of which only a Conflagrator could conceive.

The Glade is shaped like a vast dome, it's interior divided into concentric rings between which trenches full of burning coals bathe the vast chamber in a hellish glow, the higher a marines ranks in life, the closer to the centre of the Glade he will rest. A single causeway known as the Path of Ash runs from the entrance of the Glade to it's centre, bridging the fiery moats between rings. Wide enough for an entire company to stand shoulder-to-shoulder within and lined with the charred corpses of the Chapter's greatest foes tied to the very stakes their were burnt upon, the Path is a grim testament to it's masters' holy work. Finally, at the Glade's heart the former Chapter Masters and High Reclusiarchs slumber before a colossal statue of the God-Emperor sat upon his Golden Throne, forged from the finest jewels & most precious metals and hand-crafted by the only the most skilled artisans of Cardinalis.

Between the flaming trenches, the ever-present braziers of flame and the lack of proper ventilation the Glade is mercilessly hot, with it's human groundskeepers unable to even enter without specialised environmental suits to prevent a swift death by heatstroke, meaning only the Conflagrators themselves may enter without concern. Indeed, some Battle-Brothers even use the Glade as a place of spiritual and mental succour, meditating within it's sweltering depths to focus their minds and reflect upon important events & decisions.

Notable Characters

+Lord Hellfyre, Chapter Master of the Conflagrators+

http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120130180252/warhammer40k/images/b/b4/Chapter_Master_Calan.jpg

B

orn without a name in an enclave far in the north of Cardinalis, the young boy learned the rules his elders lived very early on. The strict nature of the enclave and their fiery rhetoric imprinted strongly on him. Even when he was collected from the ruins of that enclave, he held to only what knew: His faith and his discipline. As a space marine of the Conflagrators, and indeed as a chapter master, these two qualities shone through even after hypno-indoctrination. Once accepted into the chapter, he took his name - Hellfyre - from the destroyed enclave. His devotion almost earned him the black armour of a chaplain but fate intervened in the Eighteen Worlds campaign, first elevating him from sergeant to captain on Zavatista, and then onwards to chapter master later.

With the death of Chapter Master Sauvius, it was by the appointment of the chaplains that the second Conflagrator chapter master was selected. Hellfyre bypassed his elder captains on faith and demeanour alone, their years of service and experience counting for nought. Hellfyre lived up to his name, earning a dire reputation in the Liber Cluster for confronting and killing those he considered heathens. He was responsible for several incidents with other Liber Chapters, finding their stance towards Goge Vandire lacking compared to the Conflagrators' own convictions.

+Lord Kandallius, Dreadnought-Master of the Conflagrators+

L

ord Kandallius, the direct successor to Lord Hellfyre, and Chapter Master of the Conflagrators even in death, rose to command in the years after the reign of Vandire. With Hellfyre dead at the hands of the Eridian, Kandallius led crusade after crusade through the outer reaches of the Tempest, not content to waste time until his predecessor was avenged. This was to prove a fruitless endeavour, not to mention costly, and Kandallius suffered his first death at the culmination of his eighth and last crusade on Schubert's World.

After his interment, the Dreadnought-Master focused on the very real troubles the Liber Cluster and the Conflagrators themselves were embroiled within, rather than continue to pursue purging the tainted worlds of the Tempest. Even diminished, the Chapter acquitted themselves well enough under the supervision of Kandallius. Rebuilding took many years - more than Kandallius had to live. Despite this, he even presided over the Conclave of Cardinalis, adding his personal seal to a treaty that was to bind the Chapters of the Liber ever closer in the centuries to come.

Lore and Fanfiction

The Beach of Kindred Souls

W

ithin the established beachhead at the local starport on Parrias Majoris, several dozen astartes formed a loose circle around the embarkation ramp of a Thunderhawk in Blackjaw Kindred colours. Reinforcements from fleet elements had been arriving for the past hour, intermingling many colours of ceramite with the already-landed orange and white of their cousins.

On one knee before the commander of the Conflagrator contingent, several newly landed Kindred intoned thanks to Dorn for arriving safely. The mutters continued, venerating Vulkan for the opportunity to work with his advocates. Captain Raldasche stood impassive and helmetless watching the ritual. His ebony-black skin and red eyes, heritage from a singular source, was the very avatar that the Kindred sought out in every meeting with the Conflagrators. Raldasche, to his credit, kept as stony-faced as he possibly could, the creed of his chapter swimming to the fore of his mind urging him to educate his guests.

The same could not be said for Chaplain-Devotee Remis, smouldering with indignation.

"Rise up, you heathens! If you are to thank anyone it is the Emperor Himself, blessed be His name. Aye, His Primarchs were mighty indeed but it is not they who safeguard your immortal souls!" The tirade was short but passionate. Remis was not known for the sort of oratory his ilk commonly displayed. He looked as if he was about to continue the rant before Raldasche cut him short, ordering the Chaplain to administer the Conflagrator host. Converting their cousins to the true creed took passion and guile, not anger and resentment. Remis stalked away, his intentions overridden purely by his Captain's seniority within the Creed.

"Go seek your brethren." Spoke Raldasche. The Kindred saluted and moved toward the largest concentration of Kindred in the Starport, a riot of colours that most orthodox codex astartes followers found quite confusing. Raucous greetings drew inquisitive glances, and the odd withering look. The Captain resolved to sermonise the host about brotherhood before operations began in earnest at dusk. Until then, there were preparations to make. Raldasche put on his helm again.

Attack on Zavatista

T

he following operation on the refinery-world of Zavatista Lesser was planned to consist of three phases:

• Assault

This phase involved gaining orbital and air supremacy, leading onto boarding the vast refinery-ships sailing on the chem-oceans.

• Decimation

In this phase the Conflagrators and the Kindred were to meet and annihilate any resident Lion forces, preferably without destroying the refinery-ships. Seizure of the refinery-ships was named the overall objective.

• Rescue

At the insistence of the Kindred, any Imperial citizenry found during the operation will be evacuated to Kindred ships and the two mass conveyors accompanying the task force.

Little known to the Kindred, the Conflagrators drew up a fourth phase, anticipating the strategically vital Zavatista to be retaken by the Lions in the future.

• Conflagration

Beginning on the very refinery-ships that have been liberated, the Conflagrators were to conduct a 'scorched-earth' mission. First the ships would be burned, then they would be sunk. The Conflagrators, at this point, would retire to orbit where, should any infrastructure survive, their vessels would direct orbital strikes to annihilate whatever is left. Setting the chem-oceans alight was described as "likely and unsurprising".

The reasoning behind this, as much as the Conflagrators themselves are willing to impart, is down to simple strategy: Zavatista lies deep within the Eighteen Worlds, deep enough that efforts to retake the world were entirely likely and indeed expected. Rather than tie down Imperial forces in defending a strategically important planet, it was decided to render the world unimportant for the rest of the campaign.

Force dispositions:

Astartes - 2 Chapters

• Conflagrators - 112 Astartes + mission assets
• Blackjaw Kindred - 140 Astartes + mission assets

Imperial Guard - 4 Regiments

• Muldacian 20th Heavy Infantry
• Pallias 3rd Indentured
• Rusk Mechanised Urbanite Division
• Vorden Drop Troops 'The Golden Dogs'

Estimated mission time: Ten Days.

+Pict Capture: Aft structure, Command Deck, Refinery-Ship Annapurna Gate on Zavatista+

In the Void
As with many Imperial operations over the course of it's history, no plan survives contact with the enemy.

Immediately upon exiting the Warp, the Imperial fleet was confronted with its first obstacle, an orbital station of unknown provenance. The Sereiki Lions fleet, consisting mainly of destroyers and picket vessels, positioned themselves in a highly aggressive formation, yet stubbornly refused to give battle, seeking to entice the Imperial forces into the range of the station's numerous defense batteries.

In response, heavier vessels of the Conflagrators and Blackjaw Kindred forged ahead of the main fleet, plowing through the blockade of lighter vessels to launch boarding torpedoes at the defense platform.

At this point, the Lions played their second trick. Several hitherto undetected ships (later determined to be local defense monitors, lacking the ability to translate into the warp but eminently suitable for these types of engagement) powered up and began approaching the bulk troop transports and assault craft carriers from behind.

While the mission briefing had indicated Zavatista would be mainly defended by Al-Rashid's Hyena elite guard, the warriors aboard these monitors were deadlier by far. Due to the importance of its promethium output to their continued operations, the Lions had stationed an allied Astartes warband, the Untaken, as a permanent garrison over the refinery world.

The monitors housing them seem to have been custom fitted for Astartes boarding operations, with their armament consisting solely of a single spine mounted heavy cannon meant to lower the target vessel's shields for the instant their Astartes contingent needed to board and gut them. The monitors and their crew would have wreaked havoc among the transports and support vessels, but one of their targets was more than it seemed. As macro cannon shots hammered into one of the gargantuan bulk transports, the entire hull broke apart, revealing the elegant lines of an Astartes Strike Cruiser in the colours of the Blackjaw Kindred. (Analysis of IFF transmissions would later identify this vessel as the Golden Hind, a ship of the Scarlet Sentinels which had been reported lost in the hrud migration over Jusendo-XV. How the Kindred acquired it is as of this time unknown.)

Facing a common and indeed effective anti-piracy tactic of the Kin, the monitors - craft designed for quick ambushes in the void - proved lamentably incapable of standing up to an enemy Strike Cruiser. Meanwhile, kill teams of Conflagrators were burning their way towards the heart of the station, as the main force of the Imperial fleet moved to engage the bulk of the Lion fleet.

With their ambush thwarted and the linchpin of their orbital defense cordon falling silent, the Untaken and Hyena commanders seem to have elected to make a stand on the planet's surface, ordering their ships to deploy all ground capable assets they possessed and flee.

In hindsight, their strategy seems to have been to hold the Imperium at bay and buy time until reinforcements from elsewhere within the Eighteen Worlds could arrive. But with the Imperial Assault Fleets hitting multiple targets in the renegade pocket empire and the Conflagrators pushing the Imperial advance forward at a murderous pace, this proved to be an impossible task.


On Zavatista
Led by squadrons of craft in the colors of the Lions most notorious aerial units, including the bat-winged fighters of the elite Kingkillers, as well as waves of the non-Euclidean "Death Blossom" class torpedo bombers Imperial picket vessels had already learned to fear, the air-power on display gave command on the Ashmaker pause for thought. Dozens of flights launched from each city-sized ship, denying the air completely to the astartes and their allies for sixteen hours while dogfights and brutal multi-wing clashes brought dozens of craft down. The Conflagrators, not commonly known for their patience, circumvented this obstacle by launching a drop-pod assault on three of the sixteen refinery-ships of Zavatista.

Each refinery-ship, heavily armoured and thick with anti-air emplacements, brought down many of the first wave of pods. The deathwind drop pods proved largely ineffective against void shielded turrets but still mowed down dozens of defenders. The second wave came down with little better luck, the Conflagrators losing precious astartes they could ill afford to waste to the sky-trained batteries. However with marines on board, the turrets proved less effective, succumbing to melta bombs and man-portable heavy weapons one by one allowing the third wave to deploy nigh uncontested.

The Kindred followed suit, keen not to let their cousins fight unaided while the rest of the task-force waited for the skies to clear. They too launched an assault on several refinery-ships, using Land Speeders to approach their targets underneath the fire arcs of the anti-air emplacements, skimming the chem-ocean skilfully. This did come at a price - several beastmasters amongst the Lion forces called upon the denizens of the chem-oceans to defend the ships. Drawing large centipede-xenoforms to the Kindred as they approached, the beastmasters brought down a number of Speeders but fewer than they had hoped. The Kindred forced an entry near the water-line and struck from there at vital systems. Much to the admiration of their brother chapter, the Kindred forged onward despite their casualties.

Garrisoned on Zavatista was a vassal warband of astartes - The Untaken - and a sizeable contingent of the Hyenas led by a lieutenant named Skas Verrisken. Verrisken himself died in the opening hours of the engagements, thought to have died in the firestorm upon one of the three refinery-ships the Conflagrators had attacked. The Untaken, however, proved significantly harder to kill.

Unknown to the Imperial forces at the time, the appearance of these space marines threw back the assault toward the landing sites, penning in the Conflagrators and the Kindred alike. On one refinery-ship the Conflagrators were wiped out in their entirety, thirty-four Astartes brought low by a company-strength force of The Untaken. Fittingly enough, these marines were gifted a death-pyre by the vessel burning until it sank, lighting up a four-thousand square kilometre swathe of chem-ocean. Fleeing aircraft indicate the garrison and significant portion of the populace escaped the destruction of the refinery-ship, making best speed for the nearest uncontested vessel.

All of this occurred within the first day. The following week saw control of the air slowly being taken by the Imperium, craft by oil-stained craft. It was on day three that the regiments of the guard made planetfall on the remaining uncontested ships - just four of them sailed unmolested by this time. Each regiment was assigned a vessel to take and began their landings en masse, directly into the teeth of anti-air positions and the last of the Lion's airpower. As the assault continued, more and more of the defences quietened, demolition charges ruining them and making the skies safer for the following units. For each dropship destroyed or forced to land in the chem-oceans, a prayer was taken up by the Command Echelon in orbit. More than a hundred prayers sang out on the Ashmaker at the culmination of the landings.

The two surviving vessels the Conflagrators assaulted fell on day four, the structural damage and ruination of the heavy mechanics rendering them all but unusable - they were, however, in Imperial hands. Of the ships the Kindred had assailed, one had failed to fall but the four others sat dead in the water unpowered. The Kindred had struck at the Generatoria on the lowest levels, endured cramped conditions and brutal tunnel-fighting to take the objective, depriving the ships of electrical power to defend or move.

A second vessel was destroyed on day five, detonating catastrophically from within. The entire southern pole burned, marking the death-site of the Muldacian regiment. Two other ships, overtaken by the flames, sank on day seven. Emperor help whomever did not escape the slow death this brought.

On day eight, with the skies clear, interdiction runs began in earnest. Whatever enemy units and emplacements that still contested the surface of the surviving twelve refinery-ships were mercilessly gunned down or bombed asunder. With six vessels still either in enemy hands or otherwise contested, the depleted Imperial forces forged inside the four where control was challenged by Hyena and Untaken units, eager to avenge the dead.

Here The Untaken still proved a difficult foe to get to grips with but in the cramped spaces of the refinery-ships' interiors there was not enough room for manoeuvre or the usual tactics favoured by Lion forces. On the sixth day of fighting, Imperial progress was briefly shaken by the renegade Astartes deploying previously unseen Tactical Dreadnaught Armor assets, with Untaken in the relic war suits launching numerous small unit harassment strikes. Although it is doubtful the soldiers initially confronted by these shock attacks would have agreed, the coordinated offensive was ultimately a failure, with Terminator specialists among both the Kin and the Conflagrators claiming that neophytes among their Chapters could have made better use of the heavy armour. All such boasting quickly died out when it was discovered that under cover of the terror assault the bulk of the Untaken had fled the fighting, abandoning Zavatista and braving the fleet cordon in a bid to escape. Several lifters were shot down by Imperial flights but a significant portion of the group achieved orbit, commandeered a Naval destroyer and burned the engines hot for the system's edge. Any attempts to halt them failed.

Two refinery ships remained, largely undefended except for the last of the leaderless and decimated Hyenas. In the process of being assaulted by the last of the Conflagrators, the overseers, slaves and work crews surrendered unconditionally, lest they burn too. Unfortunately for them, the Conflagrators burned them anyway, steel girder stakes erected on the deck of each ship bearing two bodies each, tied back-to-back. The blackened corpses swaying in the wind offered a macabre sight to any allied units that boarded the ships afterwards, the rictus grins of the dead offering little respite to these battle-weary men.

True to plan, these ships surrendered intact began to burn. Conflagrator fire-bombs gutted the Command Centres and the Enginariums, setting ablaze the interiors and blowing out any ammunition stores the flames reached. Soon after, six more vessels burned. The refinery-ships and the chem-seas surrounding them proving untenable for Imperial forces to stay and consolidate their holdings. The Kindred, exasperated by the pyromaniacal actions of the Conflagrators, evacuated as many souls as they could from the burning ships. Kindred search teams found and disarmed each discovered fire-bomb in turn, saving the last four refinery-ships from fiery doom.

With just a quarter of the infrastructure intact at the end of the campaign and the imperial forces having suffered near to sixty percent casualties, the Conflagrators were lambasted by the surviving Naval and Guard officers for reckless endangerment of the task force. The Kindred remained conspicuously quiet. They knew the avatars of Vulkan did whatever was deemed necessary, sure of Vulkan's guiding hand. The Conflagrators, whose hand was stayed by the mere presence of the Kindred on the last ships, parted ways with the task force and returned to Cardinalis.

At the following Conclave, the Conflagrators rejected and denied assertions of careless behaviour, shouting down other advocates with reminders of the Conflagrator dead, those Kindred that had fallen in the fighting and the apparent retaking of Zavatista Lesser by Lion forces just one year later. They argued that they were justified for every action taken, every body burned and every refinery-ship sunk. Not every delegation took them for their word.

Death on the Annapurna

V

enerable Brother Scoria stood over the wrecked remains of a Dervish stalk tank, its engine oils and lubricants sprayed up the front of Scoria's sarcophagus. Littered here and there were the bodies of the dead, mostly Hyena strike teams interspersed with a Kodiak or two. They had fought hard for the command tower of the refinery-ship, defending it with their lives. The Venerable Brother's fellow Conflagrators had taken the fight to them with no regard for how they killed the enemy. Scoria himself hardly cared either but he recognised the importance of controlling the refinery-ship - the destroyed consoles and cogitators could have been useful.

They regrouped at the base of the command tower, three squads accompanied by Apothecary Culmer, Venerable Brother Scoria and Techmarines Sindre and Rotis. Brother Culmer had been busy after the battle, tying off a punctured artery and cauterising three separate stumps. Rotis and Sindre had planted fire-bombs at the bottom of the tower and in the fuel reserve. Capture was a secondary objective - the Conflagrators anticipated burning this hulk rather than keep it.

A single shot rang out, felling Culmer. His helmet and head disintegrated bloodily, shards of ceramite pinging noisily off of the surrounding brothers' armour. In the very instant after Culmer began to pitch over the Conflagrators were moving, their bolters rising to meet the unseen threat. Out of the shadows, from the alleys and the vents, huge volumes of fire descended on the loyal astartes. It was mostly chaff, low calibre weaponry better suited to the hands of guardsmen and militia, and it pattered harmlessly off of Scoria's chassis. Several higher grade weapons were identified and catalogued by the sensors, rated as high priority targets.

Scoria worked up speed charging down the first noted targets shifting from cover to cover, intent on catching them in the open with his inferno cannon. Their size initially registered them as Sereiki Lion auxiliaries before the venerable brother realised their true from: Astartes. He triggered the inferno cannon anyway. The enemies bathed in the fire for all of a few seconds before they crumpled and fell. Scoria felt a rush, sure in it's divine purity.

"My hand is death, my faith is fire!" He bellowed, a rocket propelled grenade striking his pelvis and wrecking his locomotive servos. This only served to further his fury. To him, they were heretics, deserving only of fire and flame. To them, he was a large immobile target. It took them several minutes to kill Venerable Brother Scoria, hitting him with grenades and poor quality missiles. He in turn accounted for seventeen of them, screaming zealous rhetoric as he immolated each and every one.

Of the rest of the Conflagrators, they were slowly taken apart by firepower and mob-rushes. It was inelegant and brutal. The enemy quickly set about purloining the dead of armour and arms, keen to loot the valuable astartes equipment. An unseen hand, Rotis' hand, activated a remote vox-link. This ship would burn.

Flames of Judgement - the fall of Naxa Secundus (Contributed by Ace Debonair)

T

hough many of the worlds reclaimed from the Sereiki Lions in the Eighteen Worlds Crusade were damaged badly, perhaps none suffered as much damage as Naxa Secundus and its' moon, Ogris. Naxa Secundus was a world run by crime, dominated by millions-strong gangs and the Lions' own military forces. There were no innocents - crime and violence permeated almost every aspect of Naxii life.

However, before Naxa Secundus could be dealt with, the Imperium would have to retake Ogris. Ogris was a large, barren moon that had been converted into a heavily defended and massive factorum, producing arms and armour for the Sereiki Lions' forces. Furthermore, Ogris boasted considerable orbital defences - missile grids, scatter-cannons and ground-mounted heavy lance batteries dotted the landscape, making any approach by Imperial vessels difficult. Initial attempts to claim the moon by the Imperial Guard ended disastrously, so the Space Marines were tasked with aiding in the reclamation of Ogris.

Always eager to bring the burning light of The Emperor to dark places, the Conflagrators leapt at the chance to scourge Ogris clean. Clad in the dual armours of their prized Battle Barge the Ignis Aeterna and their unbreakable faith in The Emperor, the Conflagrators' moved on Ogris without fear or hesitance. Their approach was, in part, screened by Battlefleet Elibus, which lost six vessels to Ogris' defence grid. Though tragic, it was this great sacrifice that opened the door for the Imperium to repay the debt of lives lost to the guns of Ogris. The Ignis Aeterna still suffered significant damage, losing roughly a quarter of the ship to a concentrated barrage of firepower as it drew close enough to deploy it's cargo of Space Marines. Even this damage, however, could not halt the Battle Barge, nor quell the burning fury of the Conflagrators.

The Conflagrators made landfall in spectacular fashion; drop pods and Thunderhawks alike descending on the moon with decisive, deadly swiftness, crippling gun emplacements and routing enemies with billowing waves of superheated flame. Within mere minutes the Conflagrators had deployed their Land Raider Redeemers, using them a rolling spearhead to demolish any and all attempts at resistance put up by the Lions' forces. Enemies would be creamted in waves of fire, their buildings and shelters charred into ruin and their ashes scattered to the winds. Their vengeance was absolute; the flames of their wrath burning as brightly as their flames of their inner zeal and hate.

What was left of Ogris was a blackened, desolate husk, adorned with the countless trampled and scorched skeletons of it's former defenders. Sections of the Factorum, built into the very rock of Ogris, had collapsed, leaving behind massive craters filled with the ruins of the battle and the ashes of the slain.

While the Conflagrators initiated repairs on their stricken Battle Barge and made ready to move onward, Naxa Secundus would find itself in perhaps even greater peril. Independently of the campaign plans of the Lords Inviolate, the Black Judges' Second and Fifth Companies arrived on Naxa Secundus, carrying out one of their 'prosecution campaigns' to pass judgement on this world of criminals.

Deploying on the high mountains of Naxa Secundus, the Companies of the Black Judges swept down into the planet-sprawling city below like a hammer, crushing every effort to resist their approach beneath them as they marched. Citizens and gang members of all kinds fled from the oncoming Space Marines, powerless before their wrath.

The Judges had studied Naxa Secundus for months beforehand, evaluating their crime-dominated world and weighing the actions of it's people carefully. And now they had reached their verdict: The fate of Naxa Secundus would be death, exactly as merciless and unceasing as a world with no laws deserved. However, even in this harsh sentence the Judges were not without mercy - those that chose to accept their judgement without struggle would be given a quick, clean death, and sent before The Emperor to repent their failings.

There were attempts to fight back. Gangs rallied to their leaders and attempted to halt the advance of the Black Judges, fighting with the desperation of men with everything to lose. The gangs literally numbered into the millions, and were able to bring down isolated Judges through sheer attrition despite their heavily inferior weaponry and armour. But the Black Judges would not be denied. Clad in their black cloaks, the Judges spread across the vast city as inexorably as the fall of night.

But this would not be the worst of the destruction. Having restored enough of the Ignis Aeterna to guarantee safe passage to Naxa Secundus, the Conflagrators swiftly redeployed to the sinful world, engulfing as much as they could in storms of fire.

The Black Judges had planned a more permanent fate than mere flames, however. Naxa Secundus would become an example, a warning to those who would break the laws of The Emperor and the Imperium. In several key locations, the Black Judges had set specially-constructed bombs, designed to punch holes deep into the core of Naxa Secundus and collapse sections of the planet in on itself. The Conflagrators, for their part, were simply content to reduce the world to ashes, like they had on Ogris.

When the two forces confronted each other, however, they could not agree on a course of action. The Conflagrators insisted the Judges abandon their plans and put Naxa Secundus to the flames, and the Judges were livid that another Chapter dared to question their judgement.

It is unknown if the Black Judges and the Conflagrators came to blows over this disagreement: Reports from the Black Judges indicate the Conflagrators fired on the Judges but the Conflagrators reports' deny any such thing happening. It is known, however, that the Conflagrators refused the Judges access to two of their planned bomb sites, and the Judges for their part simply returned to orbit, before detonating the bombs without any warning to the Conflagrators.

The planet underwent considerable seismic activity, and roughly a quarter of Naxa Secundus was consumed in a vast landslide. The Conflagrators' losses came to twenty-one marines, although how many of them were caused by the bomb and how many died as a result of enemy actions during the battle tends to vary from report to report.

To say the relationship between both Chapters soured drastically is to miss a perfect chance to describe the relationship between the two sides as 'allies in name only'; with both Chapters actively seeking to undermine the power, credibility and reputation of the other in the Liber Conclave for over a hundred years, all the while refusing to work together.

Kindred No More

C

haplain-Devotee Remis, now High Reclusiarch, had known all along those Kindred couldn't be trusted. He knew, Lord Hellfyre knew and most of the Devoted in the chapter knew. Remis briefly thought of Raldasche, long dead on Zavatista, along with his welcoming ways with the heathens too. Not only had he been wrong, he'd underestimated the Kindred. They all did. Those jackals had walked in the halls of the Conflagrators, had shared the hearth with them. Now it turned out that they were in league with a heretic and a liar.

The High Reclusiarch stalked the stone halls, quiet during the mandatory rest period. He continued to think further. They had to see the light, even if it had to be brought to them by fire and blade. Lying with a snake, even one that sat on Terra, deserved penitence and repenting. The Conflagrators had excoriated themselves raw for remaining in league with his cronies, his devils, for so long. To have the veil lifted was shocking to them, stunning even. They had been so blind to the atrocities that Vandire had perpetrated, it could hardly be believed. But no more. The Conflagrators were righteous, if nothing else. They would dismantle the false prophets holding here in the Cluster and put his loyalists to the sword.

Lord Hellfyre had agreed with everything Remis had suggested. Full mobilisation. They would even rouse the population of Cardinalis and bring them on the Crusade. Astropathic messages would be sent to those Remis knew Vandire had slighted. The ones that chafed against his rule. Not too long ago theConflagrators had derided them for their lack of faith. Now it was time to eat those words, spoken under the spell of false loyalty. They would burn the Vandirists. Whether on the field or on stakes, they would burn.

Santification Infernum Elegios Nomen XXVI

T

o the Conflagrators, it was merely Santification Infernum Elegios Nomen XXVI. The Blackjaw Kindred bestowed a different title upon these events: The Time of Unshed Tears.

Five full companies of Vulkan's sons, led by no less a personage than High Reclusiarch Remis himself, descended upon the Kin's fortress monastery of Vigil and demanded that the Circles present kneel before them, and surrender control of the planet, their Chapter armory, and their gene seed supply until such time as the rest of their ilk repented of the heresy of aligning with the Usurper Vandire and submitted to the Conflagrators and their allies as penance. From within the depths of the ancient xenos fortress the Kindred claimed as their sanctuary, a stunned Patriarch Corcoran, commander of the V Circle and Factor of Vigil requested time to confer with his fellows of the VI and the VIII, claiming he could not make such a decision on his own authority. Surprisingly, Remis acquiesced to the request. Less surprisingly, he ordered a full assault via drop pod and Thunderhawk preceded by an orbital bombardment as soon as the Factor broke their hololink, stating that he saw no sin in deceiving heathens and blasphemers.

Outnumbered and stunned by the unexpected attack, neither the fortress' s labyrinthine design nor its defense emplacements were able to hold back the furious onslaught. The defenders were swept away in mere hours, either slain, taken prisoner, or fled into the green hell of the acid swamps that surrounded the wall of their fortress.

Of note is that many of the veteran Conflagrators who had fought in the 18 Worlds Crusade displayed unusual (especially considering the Chapter in question) restraint in this action, accepting the surrenders of Astartes and Chapter serfs alike and attempting to limit unnecesary damage to the bastion. However, at the spearhead of the assault, where Remis's handpicked squads stormed the enemy position...there no mercy was shown, and nothing but scorched stone and corpse ash was left in their wake.

The Factor himself was immolated alive leading a final defense of the gene seed vaults. Plasma pistols in hand, he cursed Remis's parentage and personal habits with every Conflagrator he gunned down, daring the Reclusiarch to meet him in personal combat. The Chaplain's response was simply to point the head of his crozius in Corcoran's direction and state "Squad Kindled Wrath. Light and purify."

If the Reclusiarch thought the fall of the keep was the end of his holy work he was soon disabused of this notion. Significant numbers of Kin had escaped into the wilderness, and almost immediately waging a campaign of retaliation against the invaders. In the early days, many of the actions seemed aimed at harassment and humiliation more than true bloodshed. Vehicles were sabotaged, sentries were found restrained and stripped of their armor and weapons, taunting messages were scrawled within the fortress's walls, and so on.

Remis's initial response was relatively restrained. He dispatched hunter forces of Scouts, Assault Squads, and Land Speeders to track the guerilla bands...while unleashing his heaviest firepower on the local settlements, believing it was the populace's support that was allowing the infidel filth to continue to fight on. Again, he was stymied. Vigil's fishermen and trappers dwelt in the main on ramshackle littoral vessels which were almost undetectable by orbital auspex and easily moved when located by conventional reconnaissance. And many times the purgation forces found themselves ambushed. Again, Remis had cause to order several of the officers under his command to endure mortification and flagellation for their lackadaisical approach to these encounters, which consisted of trading shots at long range until such times as the Kin faded back into the depths of the marsh, penances which they bore without complaint.

With Kindred reinforcements surely en route and the forces under his command needed elsewhere, Remis now chose to cast restraint to the wind. He had every prisoner, sacred relic, and gene seed vial gathered within the Kin's shrine to Ferrus Manus (in the heretical aspect of a snake-woman mutant) located outside the main walls, and then ordered it obliterated by lance strikes from the Conflagrators battle barge in orbit while broadcasting the holy cleansing on all channels. With this act, he succeeded in eliminating even the pretense of quarter in the clashes between his forces and the Blackjaws, who now sought to kill anything wearing Conflagrators colors they could catch.
But his hopes of enticing them into open battle were doomed to failure. Instead, the insurgency rose to a murderous intensity, with attacks on a daily, sometimes hourly basis.

In perhaps the most brutal act of retribution, warriors of the VIII Circle (which venerated Ferrus above all the Nine, and whose warriors had made up the bulk of Remis's captives) captured a force of Conflagrator Scouts and subjected them to the Breaking, a grisly fate the Kin normally reserved solely for Chaos Astartes. With their bare hands, the VIII's most skilled grapplers twisted joints and broke bones until they had crippled the neophytes beyond any hope of recovery, before using combat blades to sever the nerve connections in their neck that might have allowed implantation into a Dreadnaught or bionic limb replacement. Now incapable of ever serving in a combat role (or any other role that required the use of their limbs), the young Conflagrators were branded with the crossed serpent-and-lightning bolt sigil of the Iron Maiden and left out for a patrol to find.

With his forces being whittled away, Lord Hellfyre demanding his presence, and the full might of the Blackjaws clawing through the Warp towards him, Remus ordered a withdrawal to their ships and a second, far more intense orbital bombardment, as close to full Exterminatus as his authority would permit, before making a transit to the Warp.

But even this last spiteful act would fail to bear fruit, as tac-logicians aboard the fleet noted energy signatures highly similar to active void shields igniting on the planet below almost as soon as the bombardment began.

Awaiting Doom

W

ith the bridge a ruin, Nauthiz sat in the command throne grimly assessing the situation. The Enginarium was gone. Most of the gun batteries were silent and many decks were open to the airless void. Condemnator, Objurgation’s Errand and Providence of Terra, three of the Doomsayers’ finest destroyers, were nothing more than debris and scrap metal.

The ambush had taken them by surprise, an act that Nauthiz could not forgive himself for. His men and his brothers had died because he had neglected the possibility that Lion fleet elements could be here in Imperial territory. Neglected the fact that they were as aggressive as the Imperium was. The battle was brutal, but prolonged. They had accounted for every ship the Lions had attacked with, Sereiki ships darting from the dark side of a gas giant moon, hidden by geysers spouting from the surface. But they themselves had accounted for all of the vessels Nauthiz commanded, aside from the Awaiting Doom itself.

It galled him to do so but the distress beacon had been deployed. Short of an astropathic mayday, which was impossible with a dead astropathic choir, it was the best means for requesting aid at his disposal. Enemy boarders had yet to take the bridge but, when they tried, they would not get it. This he vowed.

As if on cue, with cruel theatrical timing, the doors to the bridge were breached. Only Brothers Calamis and Convisia were with Nauthiz in holding back the tide – two heavily built Kodiaks led the way followed by a veritable horde of cackling Hyenas. Nauthiz knew of the Kodiaks, they matched Astartes in size and displayed considerable strength. But they were also slow, unlike the Doomsayers they faced. Calamis gutted the Kodiak he fought with, his power sword making a mockery of the heavy carapace plating the Kodiak wore. His return strike beheaded the brute. He then turned to face a pack of Hyenas.

Hyenas. Never as large as the Kodiaks but augmented in ways that often made them tougher to handle than other mortals. They were never going to best an Astartes in single combat, even when a Kodiak stood the chance to, but that wasn’t the point. They hunted in packs. Never alone and certainly not in twos or threes. Always, always packs. That was how they bested Astartes. Weight of numbers.

They killed Convisia with a thousand cuts, aiming for soft joins or damaged armour plating. He didn’t go down easily but he still died. Nauthiz felt his expression harden further, weighting the thunder hammer in his hands. He didn’t see Calamis fall but the veteran's fury had abated, falling silent even as Nauthiz engaged with the enemy.

His first swing demolished the leading vanguard of Hyenas. The backswing crippled the other Kodiak by ruining the wretch's legs. A ceramite boot ended his pitiable squalling. After that, the melee felt unreal, like it was happening to someone else. Nauthiz watched as his body beat back the horde, taking the sorts of punishment that they could not. Over as many minutes, Nauthiz took ten steps back. He now stood by the command throne, bleeding and battered. An axe had lodged itself deeply in his chest plate, forcing his second heart to pick up the slack. Lips slick with rich, dark blood bubbling from his ruined lungs, he continued to bleed from several lesser wounds. The augmented astartes physiology could only do so much, and Nauthiz felt weaker by the minute.

A smile crept across the Chapter Master's face. Another rush was forming and he knew this was his fate. To die on the bridge of the Awaiting Doom. He sat down, content in knowing that these enemies of the Emperor would die just as surely as he would. This was his bridge and his ship. Thunder Hammer at rest across his lap, Nauthiz called up a display inside his helm, bringing to life a final bridge protocol.

The command “PURGE?” flashed up. The laughing Hyenas closed in, eager to claim him. His smile grew.

“Doom on you!” He cried.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The stink of burnt promethium, an acrid tang every Conflagrator grew to love in their first years, was strong here. The Awaiting Doom felt like a tomb of a ship, populated by dead men. Every system, including the warp engines, had either been shut down, damaged beyond use or hibernated from lack of input. What had actually happened here?

The Conflagrator boarding party passed the burned husks of many Doomsayer menials and serfs as they moved through the command decks but, much more satisfyingly, as they neared the bridge there had to be scores of Sereiki Lion corpses twisted and curled by the inferno. These were not simple 'Coyotes' judging by their equipment. Cooked off grenades and munitions left many bodies with self-inflicted wounds.

The wreck of a cruiser, one of the Sereiki fleet no doubt, floated past a stained glass window as the Awaiting Doom continued to slowly spin on its axis. Captain Kandallius assumed the Lions had ambushed the Awaiting Doom and boarded it, selling their own ship for the price of taking an Astartes vessel. The Doomsayers had struck the enemy in the command tower and the engines – there was little chance that the crippled foe could’ve done anything more than fire at opportune moments into the black. With no guiding commands and no manoeuvring, each gun was reliant on its own field of fire to put effective shots on their foe. The Doomsayers knew this.

The Awaiting Doom had been swamped with boarders, Hyenas and possibly Kodiaks, making their way to the vital areas of the ship. Facing Doomsayers though, they had a tough fight. The enginarium was expectedly a scene of slaughter with all but a scant few Hyenas killed in the battle. These last wretches were disposed of in short order by Techmarine Lumios and the squad supporting him. He had counted fifteen dead Doomsayers there.

On the bridge itself there was only one truly important detail: Chapter Master Nauthiz had died here. His body, beneath the soot and the burning, had taken such punishment that it was difficult to identify the markings adorning his plate. Furrows from blades and craters from ranged weaponry pock marked the suit, compromising it in a dozen places. The power axe jutting up from the chest of Master Nauthiz looked to be the culprit of a mortal blow, perhaps enough to have killed the chapter master. It mattered little for the Lions. They had burned for their temerity. The Captain’s lip curled upward at the thought.

Kandallius stared at the corpse, wondering if it was worth committing the already charred body to another pyre. With Nauthiz and every Doomsayer between here and Nabaretti dead, it fell to Kandallius to make a claim: A Right of Salvage. The Awaiting Doom would fight on, even if no Doomsayer could. As far as he was aware, the chapter was truly dead.

Return of the Doomsayers (Written in part by helterskelter)

T

he gathering of the Chapters had nearly come to it's conclusion, representives from all the Liberite chapters, Mechanicum and various other factions had convened at Cardinalis. Ships of all berths filled the skies or held Orbit in atmosphere, preparing to take their leave once the meeting ended, and the council parties returned to their ships.

Planetside, a great hall lined with burning braziers, filled with delegates, one final issue was to be raised.

+Assembled brethren,+ boomed the mighty Conflagrators dreadnought. +We have received Transmissions from a Chapter long thought lost. We- +

He was cut off abruptly by blaring sirens, warning of an unscheduled warp translation. There was a buzz of confusion, many commanders voxing their ships for conformation. Reports were coming in of a fleet entry, though numbers could not be confirmed.

A message cut through the noise.

+This is Commander Fryg, of the Doomsayers vessel Voidfarer's Doom. You will return the Awaiting Doom and release the remains of Chapter Master Kaunaz to us. This, I command. Failure to comply will be met with Violence. If you fail to respond. Doom On You!+


For a moment, the crowd simply listened. Once the message had ended, they turned to the Conflagrators expecting a response. It would be a lie to claim that all assembled knew which way this would go. They did not. Some guessed while others reserved any conclusion at all. It was well known that any Conflagrator could be an intractable soul, even more so with a veteran.

+Listen to me and listen well, Commander Fryg.+ Ordered Kandallius. +You claim you are a Doomsayer! I demand that you show us proof. I was there to see the last fallen Doomsayer, and all of the Doomed fought no more. That day was a dark one for the Imperium. If you are who you purport to be, the ashes of Kaunaz are yours. His remains mean less to us than the Awaiting Doom does.+ A pregnant pause, deliberately left by the wily dreadnought, stretching out to emphasise his authority. +You may come to the Awaiting Doom itself, Fryg. Matters can be discussed there. Keep your retinue to a minimum when you board.+

A response did not come. The Voidfarer's Doom altered to an intercept course. They were heading straight towards the Awaiting Doom.

+Contact the brothers on the Awaiting Doom. Advise them of the situation.+ Kandallius told his attending techmarine. +I have pressing matters to tend to.+ He turned to the delegations again and began to finalise the agreements. The end of the Conclave of Cardinalis would be a day to remember, for more than one reason.


The Voidfarer's Doom was not the only ship on an intercept course. The entire Doomsayers fleet was heading towards Cardinalis, each ship vectoring in on a cousin vessel. Warning bells rang incessantly, the vox network was sheer mayhem. The seeming audacity of the approaching fleet made no sense to any of the commanders, captains, or admirals. Then all of a sudden the fleet slowed to a stop. Everything was still in the void.

In the belly of the Awaiting Doom, lights began to flicker. A deep, bass thrum was building. The Conflagrator techmarines in the teleportarium felt the prickle of building static, and knowing what was about to occur, manically tried to shut down the teleporter. What followed was both blinding and deafening. With a sound like a thousand bolters firing at once, and flashes akin to hundreds of blind grenades being set off, the teleportarium did its work. Never had so many smelt burning ozone simultaneously.

Stood in the middle of the Conclave was Captain Fryg. Slowly, he removed his helm, placed it on his belt and turned to face the Lord Machine of the Conflagarators. Surrounding Fryg were 20 veterans of the Doomsayers, armed with Boarding shields and a variety of weapons dangerous to every being in the room.

"All of your ships have been boarded, and all those in charge of those very ships have a bolter pointed at their heads. If our loyalty and lineage are in question, please, take a sample of our genetic material to your apothecarian and I will personally answer any questions your librarium and reclusiam have. Now, my Brother, do we have a seat at this council?"


Lord Kandallius, easily towering over the Doomsayers in his relic Contemptor chassis, regarded the insertion team. He surveyed each member, weapon and position relative to himself and the other delegations present. Bolters, meltas, plasma pistols, even a power fist or two. Fryg himself carried a thunder hammer.

A great booming laughter echoed through the chamber, the augmitters on the dreadnought blaring out Kandallius' amusement, crackling slightly with distortion. Fryg himself did not appreciate the outburst, a look of anger flashing across his face.

"Do you mock us, dreadnought?" The Captain stepped forward, pointing his hammer at Kandallius.

+It is not mockery, little one. I think Kaunaz would be proud of you.+ Another chuckle burbled from the dreadnought. +You've got guts, Fryg.+

"I am doing what is necessary." His face still contorted in displeasure, the Captain tipped his chin. Lord Kandallius was toying with him, surely.

+No doubt. Apothecary Lavis and High Reclusiarch Volcus will be here shortly. If they are satisfied, I am satisfied.+ An audible sigh of relief came from the human delegations - they clearly had no desire to experience a close quarters post-human battle personally - and the other Doomsayers appeared to be relaxing their combat stances a fraction.

"And the Awaiting Doom?"

+It will be relinquished on one caveat.+ His Contemptor-bulk leaned forward, bringing his chassis face to face with Fryg. The Captain raised an eyebrow.

"Which is?"

+A crusade. Let it be here and now on Cardinalis that we vow to crush every loathsome renegade and foul turncoat in this sub-sector. I might be satisfied that you are who you say you are by the end of tonight but trust will be earned with deeds, not words. The Emperor gained His son Vulkan by deeds, blessed be His name.+ Kandallius straightened up. +Prove yourselves not to me but to Him, and the Liber Cluster will rejoice with open arms at their guardians of old, returned from the grave.+

Trial by Fire

C

haplain Oxidus surveyed the group of supplicants, pleased with what he saw. Each of them bloody and exhausted, each of them a killer of men. The tallest one, who came up to his elbow, was still bleeding badly from his duel. Beneath his skull-helm, Oxidus allowed his lips to curl into something resembling a smile. He recalled his time in the proving grounds, remembering the faces of those he killed and those he would end up calling brother.

It had been a particularly bloody event this time, whittling the prospective Conflagrators down from several hundred to merely forty. Well, thirty-nine. One of the winners had already expired. It may very well end up being thirty-eight soon but the Chaplain cared not. If the boy lived, he would deserve his chance. It was not unusual for a crop to lose a few more bodies even after the combat-trials had ended. Oxidus continued to look over the group, watching for weakness. He looked upon them with a sneer.

"Well done Kindling. You have survived, and the best of you thrived. Do not take this as a guarantee that you will become one of us, you have merely proved that you can kill. I expect half of you to fail what is to come, if not more." The Chaplain moved to the half-dead boy, prodding his slick wound. The boy grimaced and grunted in pain, although he stayed standing. "You will have to be strong in body, in mind and in soul."

Oxidus removed his helm, revealing a hawkish visage marred with bionics and smeared grey with ash. He regarded them with an unwavering stare from his single crimson eye.

"You now, more than ever, belong to the Emperor. You may have revered him before, but now you are his chosen. You will die before you dishonour him." Oxidus beckoned over some Chapter serfs, led by an irascible man of middle-years. "Take them away." Was all the Chaplain had said, the serfs knew what to do. Two of them lifted the injured lad and hauled him away by his armpits.

Oxidus looked back over the combat grounds and the dead. Blood and bowels covered much of the area, silent with the exception of the crackle of flames. The Chaplain exited through the grand arch that served as both entrance and exit, confident that the serfs cleaning up would burn the corpses and strip any useful clothing by themselves.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

Doomsayers

 

The Doomsayers Space Marine chapter came to the Liber Cluster chasing Renegades who sought to elude them. What the Renegades were unaware of, was that the Doomsayers were masters of void warfare, a heavy preference laid upon it over other forms of fighting. They were hunted down and utterly annihilated, but being a suspicious sort, the Doomsayers remained in case there were more.

 

Chapter Master Kaunaz leads from the principal battlebarge "The Awaiting Doom", his command dais in the centre of a holographically projected stellar map, which contains the locations of each and every Doomsayers vessel, current allies, and mission specific details. He also happens to be the inventor of a manouvre that saved a [insert chapter here] cruiser from complete destruction. The [inset chapter here] cruiser had been ambused by several [insert enemy here] vessels, when a patrol of Doomsayers warped into the region. Upon discovery of the engagment, all haste was made to assist the loyalist ship, and though she had put up a good fight, the tide was turning against her. Kaunaz seeing the formation of the enemy ordered his vessels into the wake of the others, so when the [insert enemy here] detected them, only one vessel was picked up on the auguries. The Doomsayers had the upper hand, and the enemy came to realise too late what would happen to them. The first ship turning to engage became alerted to the engine flares of Kaunaz's patrol fleet behind the first ship, and unable to breakaway with any speed, was torn asunder by no fewer than 4 consecutive broadsides. The rest of the battle was over soon, and a debt of gratitude was owed.

 

As with most naval warfare, boarding actions also must occur, and the Doomsayers do not shy away from becoming personal with their enemies. Boarding shields are a favourite tool amongst many of the brothers, and the shieldwalling of corridors is a popular tactic in denying the enemy. The first company maintains a few suits of Terminator armour, which are utilised primarily for the boarding of capitol ships. Such priceless relics should only be used when there is much honour to be won.

 

"The Awaiting Doom" also has access to a teleportarium, which the adeptus mechanicus would surely like yo get their hands on. The technology is beyond price to them, and though the Doomsayers closely guard all their assets, it will not stop the mechanicum from trying to obtain such a prize.

 

Origins

 

The Doomsayers were given the planet of Ushion VII as its Home World and Domain of the said Worlds in the Aquarii Cluster in Ultima Segmentum. While on a full Chapter deployment along with the Ultramarines, Marines Errant against  Large Incursion of Orks from Charadon Sector, They recieved a distress call from Ushion Vll. Upon entering the system from the warp the Navigators and Librarians fell Unconscious from 20 billion Souls screaming from the Warp.

 

Further in system the Fleet encountered the remains of their Home World. Further investigation on one of defense platforms the cause. Left on the chest of one of the few Brothers left to watch over the Home World impaled with  the Brothers Power Sword was a Pauldron of the Crystal Skulls a former allie of the Doomsayers that turned Renegade.

 

With the destruction of their Home World the Doomsayers have become a Fleet based Chapter.After years of Searching for the Renegades they finally caught up with the renegades entering the Libre Cluster.Engaging the Renegades ship to ship the Doomsayers superioity in numbers assured victory, With the Crystal Skulls force all but destroyed . CM Kaunaz and the Terminator Elite Teleported to the last Crystal Skulls ship. 

 

Combat Doctrine of the Doomsayers

 

Since the destruction of their Home World the Doomsayers have become a Space bound Chapter.In the years that followed they have become the Masters of Navel and Void Warfare.Sternguard Vanguard Squads wear suits of Void harden Armour. While specialist Squads in each Company also have The Harden Armour along with Boarding Shields.

 

Beside Boarding Torpedos they have Caestus Assualt Rams and the Vaunted Thunderhawk Gunships and various other classes of Astartes Aircraft. At this time the size of the Doomsayers fleet is unknown. At entering the Cluster 4 Companys are present. The rest are presently  in route.

 

The Doomsayers follow Standard Codex Tactics for planetary assualts and such. But it is Brutal face to face Boarding Action that Doomsayers Crave.

 

 

Doomsayers Geneseed

The Doomsayers Geneseed appears to be stable,but for a slight defect in the Catalepsean which makes it impossible for true sleep.That could be the possible reason for The Doomsayers to a Morse & Moody lot. The Doomsayers direct lineage to the Ultramarines could be placed in doubt given their mood they seem more to be a direct link to the Doom Warriors.Also Sons of Guilliman.

 

With the Destruction of their Fortress Monastery and Home World it is unknown how much Geneseed they have or when they last tithed any to the Mechainum.

 

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE EAGLES OF GLORY

"One Imperium, under the Emperor!"

 

 

Often thought to be one of the most far-reaching Astartes chapters, the Eagles of Glory have become subjects of much praise by regiments of the Astra Militarum and regular imperial citizens alike. Wherever aid may be needed in the Liber Cluster, they shall be quick to provide support. They often join the regiments of the Liber Cluster in campaigns on the many worlds where xenos still reside, or come to the rescue of an imperial world being besieged by the xenos trying to remove humanity from the cluster.

 

Descending from the Imperial Fist by virtue of the Red Templar, the Eagles of Glory perform many operations that when compared to those of other Astartes chapters could be considered humanitarian. They will willingly provide relief and supplies for imperial forces and citizens whenever possible.

 

However, they have come under scrutiny by other Astartes chapter due to their belief that it is the Emperor’s divine will the chapter expand the reach of the Imperium and help to colonise the worlds they conquer. This ’manifest destiny’ is viewed as arrogant by other chapters who believe the Eagles of Glory seek only to increase their power and control in the Liber Cluster.

 

The home world of the Astartes chapter is the temperate hive world of Libertas. The world boasts a great diversity of peoples and beliefs, having been colonised by imperial citizens from all corners of the Sol System. The chapter prefers to leave the majority of the planet’s political actions to the population of Libertas, while the planetary governor is the 1st company captain of the Eagles of Glory. The chapter does not do extensive recruiting, as there are many volunteers to the process. It is considered the greatest honour for a family to have a son become one of the Emperor’s greatest warriors.

 

Even though the other chapters of the Liber Cluster are distrustful of the expansionist ideals of the Eagles of Glory, they will accept their aid without second thought. The chapter always strikes fast and hard, often bringing an entire battle company to the conflict to ensure that the Emperor’s justice is rightfully enacted. The Eagles of Glory are also one of the most common attendants of the Liberite Conclave, often putting in their word on whatever discussion is occurring at the time.

 

COMBAT DOCTRINE OF THE EAGLES OF GLORY:

 

"Damn the lances! RAMMING SPEED!!!"

 -4th Company Captain Davian Farrigun, Master of the Fleet.

 

Brash, headstrong and always searching for the next chance to prove themselves, the Eagles of Glory could easily be mistaken for sons of the Great Khan rather than their true Primogenitor, the Emperor's Praetorian Rogal Dorn.

Again the same assumption could be easily forgiven were one to look at their preferred style of warfare, as the Eagles live by the philosophy “the best defence is a strong offence" and believe that the quicker they can crush one enemy and move on to the next, the better.

 

It is with this strike first, strike hard mentality in mind that the Eagles have shaped their battle doctrine, believing that the ideal fight is one in which your first blow is also your last, hitting the foe without warning and with such overwhelming force that nothing can resist you.

 

As a result, the Eagles are constantly on patrol, combing the far reaches of the Cluster for enemies. Upon the discovery of a threat the Astartes make all haste to the warzone, heedless of whether their help is needed or wanted, and engage the enemy immediately. In naval actions, their ships are infamous for aggressively engaging hostile fleet elements as well as performing daring manuvers that, although undeniably effective, border on the reckless.

At the same time, the Eagles will deploy en mass to the embattled planet's surface via drop pods and Thunderhawk Gunships, often right on top of, the enemy positions. While this approach is highly dangerous it also grants the Eagles an advantage in that their opponents will have almost no time to prepare for the onslaught that is about to assail them.

 

As the fiery forms of Drop Pods hammer down to disgorge dozens of Tactical and Assault marine into the embattled foe, Thunderhawk landers will deploy spearheads of Predator Tanks and Bike Squads nearby to support the first wave as Land Speeder and Stormtalon Gunship squadrons scream through the skies overhead to lay the target to waste.

Once all opposition has been neutralised and any objectives secured the Eagles will return to their ships and set off once more, leaving the corpse-choked battlefield as quickly as they came.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

The Heralds of Letum

“We honor Letum with our lives and the lives of His foes.”

 

 

 

Proud sons of Jaghatai Khan, the Heralds of Letum were created during the 21st Founding. Although initially intended for Segementum Tempestus, the Chapter was accidentally assigned to the Liber Cluster expedition through a simple clerical error. The scribe responsible was executed for his incompetence, but by then the fleet had long since left.

 

The Chapter chose their name upon taking the world of Libitum as their home world. The feral natives clash with each other over resources in their underground settlements, and as worship of their version of the Emperor, the death god Letum. The Heralds view themselves as angels of their god, and will go to great lengths to slay enemies of the Imperium. The Chapter refuses to recruit psykers or fight alongside them. Instead the Heralds have the office of the Bone-Seers, Chaplain-mystics who maintain Chapter records and often resolve important decisions through reading bones for the answer. The bones used are always from proud heroes of the Chapter who still guide the Heralds in death. The Bone-Seers also maintain records of foes the Chapter has fought, with notes on successful tactics against those enemies. The contents of these records are often debated amongst the Chapter’s Captains, and occasionally improved upon.

 

Like their parent Chapter, the White Scars, the Heralds of Letum favor lightning assaults. Unlike the White Scars, the Heralds’ armoury is almost exclusively composed of aircraft, which spearhead all of their campaigns. The Chapter maintains a small number of tanks, which are only deployed when needed. The Heralds of Letum prefer to fight alone, often refusing the aid of others. This has led to tense relations with the Eagles of Glory, whose almost constant offers of aid irritate the Heralds greatly. The Heralds rarely attend the Liberite Conclave, though when they do it is often to deliver important information to the Conclave. Such was the case when the Heralds brought news of the approach of Waaagh! Guznat, which saved many Imperial worlds.

 

The Heralds of Letum regularly send strike forces into the darker corners of the Liber Cluster. The Chapter has slain many possible threats before they could endanger the Liber Primus Sub-Sector. It is believed that several uninhabited worlds the reclamation fleets have encountered are the work of the Heralds of Letum. The Heralds do not care if their actions are recognised, only that they do the Emperor’s work.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

Iron Ravagers
 

The Iron Ravagers are descended from the lineage of Ferrus Manus. They have established their home world on the planet of Anesidora, a planet dominated by virulently fertile jungle. The Iron Ravagers share their forefather’s contempt for the weakness of flesh, and embrace the sacrifice of much of what makes them human in pursuit of a perfect blend of human and machine.

If Anesidora was settled by humans during the initial settlement of the Liber Cluster, the jungle has long since erased all evidence of their fate. The Iron Ravagers were attracted to the planet by the unique metallic and crystalline structure of the planet – which both supports the abundance of ‘hyper-life’ on the planet, but more pertinently offers a wide variety of valuable resources, including much that the chapter itself covets, notably extraordinary veins of the psychically resonant psycurium. The Ravagers are warriors, not miners however, and offered to share custody of the world with the agents of the Adeptus Mechanicus in a deal that is perhaps unique in the Imperium. The chapter safeguards the world, receives privileged access to the resources it produces, and recruits from its Martian derived population.

The ability of the chapter to consistently identify sufficient numbers of suitable candidates from the relatively small population, many of whom are too altered to breed, would in other circumstances perhaps attract more curiosity. In the frontier that is the Liber Cluster, it is just one anomaly amongst many. As it is, rumours circulate of arcane biological processes and clones, hot-housed in the super-fertile environment of Anesidora.

Given the constant struggle of the machines of the Mechanicus to overcome the virulent life of the planet in order to extract its mineral wealth, the Ravagers' inherited distaste of the biologic has only been reinforced. As a symbol of their rejection of the physical identity of their birth, in favour of the engineered perfection that is fusion of humanity and machine, they undergo an elective augmetic alteration soon after their initial induction into the chapter. Unlike the artificial fists of the Iron Hands, it is their face that is replaced, with a smooth, featureless adamantium face-plate being grafted onto their skull. While it leaves their superior Astartes sensory faculties intact, these identical face-plates give the Ravagers a disturbingly identical appearance.

The Ravagers are broadly codex-adherent in terms of their organisation and battle-field approach. The chapter perhaps unsurprisingly boasts a high number of techmarines and makes extensive use of dreadnought armour. Their approach to battle reflects the duality of their Primarch’s approach to war – a coldly logical and exactly preparation and execution of their duty, combined with a terrible wrath that overflows when confronted with the enemy. The Ravagers have developed their approach to war to successfully include the wrathful zeal that seizes them in the heat of battle as a factor to be counted upon, and used to their advantage. 

 

Chapter Symbol

 

Their chapter badge with the fourth and fifth digits depicted as augmetic replacements - symbolic of the weaker aspects of their flesh (the weaker ring and pinky fingers) being replaced by elements of the machine. (Excuse the very basic MS Paint version used here - I think it conveys the idea at least).

 

Recruitment

 

The abhorrence of weakness means the recruitment process of the Iron Ravagers is particularly brutal, even by Astartes standards. Only the strongest, toughest, most cunning, may join the ranks, so by extension there can be only one Aspirant left at the end of the trials. On the worlds from which they source their Aspirants, arenas have been constructed, designed to push potential candidates to their very limits. Intense heat, blistering cold, extreme winds, separating floors, and death traps all feature, with the faceless Ravagers standing sentinel over the proceedings.

The last Aspirant standing (if such a thing can be said) is then taken immediately to begin the implantation process. No respite is given, not an ounce of weakness can ever be shown. At any point if the potential Astartes ever begs for mercy, he is put down. Some have even gone mad at the sight of themselves, a reflection of a cold, faceless monster, and again these poor souls are ended for their weakness. Those that survive all of this are inducted to the ranks of the Iron Ravagers, with no trace of weakness anywhere to be found within them.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE LORDS INVIOLATE

“By blood bound!”

 

 

It should come as no surprise that the Chapter of the Adeptus Astartes selected to provide centralized leadership for the Liberite Chapters would be an Ultramarines Successor; however, the selection of the Lords Inviolate came from more esoteric means. The Imperial Tarot sees use across the Imperium, among Imperial citizens of all walks of life. It has decided the fates of worlds and crusades, and while there are many who would prefer to use logic and reasoning when making decisions, there are enough of those who feel the hand of the Emperor upon these cards to see its use again and again. Whichever soul had within its hands the fate of the Liberite Chapters chose to put that fate into the Emperor’s, and all cards pointed to the Lords Inviolate Chapter.

 

It was a fortuitous choice, for the Lords Inviolate are well disposed to the handling of brother Chapters and, with the Imperial center so far away, thriving on its own. The Lords coordinate well with other Imperial forces, keeping close ties with the Liber Guard. They have thoroughly adopted the Codex Astartes as penned by their father, Roboute Guilliman. The Lords instinctively understood from the beginning that if they tried to assert their authority with a stern hand it would crumble before their eyes, and as such, they provide only quiet guidance to other Liberite Chapters. Though perhaps gentle in their position over the other Liberite Chapters, it does not mean that they doubt their authority or right to command and see it as the means to enact their will without the others harboring hostility or jealousy. With their strong tactical and logistic predilections, the Liberites have flourished under their guiding hands.

 

The Lords Inviolate have taken for themselves a realm not unlike the distant Ultramar Realm of their progenitor. Initially taking a world classified as a death world, they have since largely pacified and colonized it, utilizing it as their Fortress-Monastery. They also claim ownership of half a dozen other worlds, of varying types. These other worlds are of extensive, valuable use to the Chapter, providing recruits, equipment, shipyards and other resources to the Lords Inviolate. These Fortress Worlds of the Lords Inviolate are deep within the densely packed center, and as such are tightly knit together, their realm being of far smaller size than the famed Ultramar.

 

Over time, the Chapter cult has grown more attached to the Liber Cluster, cementing into the minds of the battle-brothers their Emperor-granted right and duty to maintain the Cluster for the Imperium. It is not unknown for Marines of the Lords Inviolate to keep tokens of the worlds they have traveled to, often-small stones that they keep within a pouch and carry around with them. A mosaic map of the Cluster dominates a wall deep within the Chapter Librarium, its dimensions and subject picked out by precious stones gathered from the very worlds and other locales that they are placed to represent. It is said that the Librarians have psychically attuned this mural, and it has on more than one occasion operated as an early alert system. This mindset of glorifying the Liber Cluster has provided them with a particular hatred for those found to have so thwarted humanity’s first attempts within the Cluster, the alien and the heretic. Though remnants of these beasts and traitors remain, it has not been for the lack of trying.

Combat Doctrines

 

"The key to victory is to have your opponent watch one hand while the other reaches for his throat." Captain Dorvius - 3rd Company of the Lords Involate

 

The Lords Inviolate are studious and steadfast warriors, keen of intellect and strong of will. They adhere to the tenets of flexible warfare as laid out in the Codex Astartes; relying on tried and tested battle tactics supplemented by unexpected and tangential manoeuvres to mislead and confuse enemies. All manners of weaponry and armour see use in the Chapter, the better to respond to any threat that might see the Liber Cluster torn from the Imperium's grasp.

Captains of the Lords Inviolate are almost peerless strategists, able to swiftly and decisively take command of any given situation and turn it to their eventual advantage. This ability has given the Lords Inviolate a reputation for remarkable capability and exceptional force management not only amongst their brother Space Marines, but amongst Imperial forces of all kinds.

 

Home World - Pellucid 

 

The Lords Inviolate recruit from an advanced world close to the heart of the Liber Cluster. Its continents are bowl-shaped. Long, unbroken mountain chains form along the coastlines, holding the great oceans and seas from spilling into the low-lying hills, valleys and savannahs that form the majority of land. The world was initially classified as a deathworld, for its native life was in its megafauna stage of development, the lands and seas dominated by immense, cumbersome creatures, with numerous apex predators, their jaws and claws strong enough to rend even the holy armour of the Imperial Guard mechanized regiments.

 

Within scant centuries, most species of megafauna became extinct, including all apex predators. Only those great, domesticated herd beasts are safe from endangerment, and the world has long since been reclassified.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE SCARLET SENTINELS

"Second to None."

SUMMARY:

Brother Raleigh of 1st Company, art by Blazbaros.

▪ GENE-SEED (PREDECESSOR) – Imperial Fists

▪ FOUNDING - 21st "Cursed" Founding
▪ CHAPTER MASTER - Lord Marshal Horatio Woodrow, High Praetorian of the Trinity Worlds, Defender of the Realm, Steward of Albion

▪ CHAPTER WORLD - Albion System "Trinity Worlds"- Anglin, Caledon & Cambris
▪ FORTRESS MONASTERY - The White Hall (Converted Star Fort)
▪ MAIN COLOURS – Red and White with Black Helms
▪ SPECIALITY - Urban Combat, Zone Mortalis Operations, Boarding Operations & Naval Warfare.
▪ BATTLE CRY – “Scarlet Sentinels!” Response – “Second to None!”
▪ CURRENT STRENGTH - 834
▪ KNOWN DESCENDANTS - None

Origins:

Descended from the Gene-line of the VII Primarch, the illustrious Rogal Dorn, the Scarlet Sentinels have inheirited their Primogenitor's legacy of loyalty, honour, and pig-headed stubborness. Distantly ruling the Albion system from their spacebound Fortress-Monastery known as the White Hall, the Sentinels poach the most promising recruits from the system's three inhabitited worlds of Anglin, Caledon and Cambris. All three are feudal worlds, the most advanced of which had only recently discovered gunpowder at the time of rediscovery and the many quarrelling kingdoms on each planet provide the Chapter with a bountiful supply of potential recruits as well as a strong base from which to operate from.

Amongst the Astartes of the Liber Cluster the Scarlet Sentinels are renowned for the strength and skill of their Chapter Fleet, as well as it's larger-than-average number of vessels, thanks to deals with the Adeptus Mechanicus regarding mining rights to the Albion system's vast asteroid belts and many uninhabitable moons. As a result the Scarlet Sentinels can often be found escorting or leading expeditionary fleets into unexplored or hostile regions across the length and breadth of the Liber Cluster and they are often the first Chapter called upon whenever unusally troublesome or difficult xenos raiders make themselves known.

Generally the Scarlet Sentinels are well respected among the Chapters and Organizations of the Liber Cluster, their honourable conduct in battle, disciplined nature and exemplary service in the Emperor's name having earned them great recognition. One of their most notable allies is the Lords Inviolate, who the Scarlet Sentinels have worked alongside many times, building strong bonds of brotherhood between the two Chapters throughout the years. However, relationships with certain other Astartes , such as the excessively destructive Conflagrators, are less then steadfast, the worst without doubt being the hostile relations with the Eagles of Glory. Despite both being children of Rogal Dorn these two sister Chapters could not stand further apart, a bitter eninimity existing since the earliest days of the Imperium's second expansion into the Cluster when the two groups were paired together as a joint strike fleet that personally retook several systems from a minor Ork empire.

As the Sentinel-led fleet annihilated their Greenskin counterparts in orbit around a planet the Eagles would perform mass orbital drops onto the enemy strongholds, hammering down upon them like the Emperor's fist and liberating those human populations that had lived as slaves to the Orks for centuries. It was this that gained the Eagles such immense adoration from the liberated worlds while the Sentinels, whose part in the fight had been mostly confined to orbital superiority, were largely forgotten. The bitterness that resulted finally came to a head when the planet of Libertas was awarded to the Eagles by the Liber Conclave as their homeworld in recognition of their efforts, the Lord Marshall of the Sentinels, fuming at the news, was said to have angrily departed the Conclave without a word, taking his Chapter with him.

Homeworld:

The White Hall, Chapter Fortress-Monastary.

Unlike most Chapters the Scarlet Sentinels do not recruit from one world in paticular but instead recruit from the so-called "Trinity Worlds" of the Albion System; Anglin, Caledon and Cambris. All three are classified as feudal worlds and are divided between the various squabbling kingdoms, clans and tribes that inhabit them, though all swear unconditional oaths of fealty and servitude to their distant Astartes masters and the Sovereign Emperor.

Anglin, the most technologically advanced of the three worlds, is a world of island kingdoms, republics and empires quarreling over territory and resources constantly, waging war with flintlock rifles and blackpowder cannons. Caledon is a rain-soaked planet of dark forests, craggy highlands and snow-capped mountains home to medieval clan-kingdoms bound by strict codes of honour, its people wear brightly patterned garments to show allegiance and possess a deep love of drink and battle. Cambris is a verdant world of rolling green hills and mysterious forests, its people live in fortified villages and are skilled horsemen, as adept with bow and sword as they are in the saddle, making them highly effective raiders.

The Fortress-Monastary of the Scarlet Sentinels, the White Hall is unusual in that rather than being a stationary structure, is a fully mobile Star Fort of ancient STC design similiar to the famous Ramilles class, albeit far smaller. It was discovered by the Scarlet Sentinels in the waning days of the Imperium's Reclamation Crusade following the Silence, adrift without power in a distant orbit at the edge of the Albion's gravitational field. After purging a tribe of Ork Lootaz squatting within, the Lord Marshall eagerly claimed the Fort by right of conquest and once the human-inhabited Trinity Worlds were discovered further in-system he decided that the White Hall (so-named for the sun-bleached colour of the Fort's exterior at the time) would be converted into the Chapter's Fortress-Monastary, forever watching over the Albion system and acting as a home port for the Sentinels' growing fleet of ships, a role in which it has served admirably in ever since.

Present Activities:

The Scarlet Sentinels are currently still active in the Liber Cluster and have recently intensified patrols in co-operation with the Imperial Navy due to an increase in pirate activity around The Tempest as well as Imperial systems bordering the Deep. The Sentinels attend the Liber Conclave regularly and are well-known as a stabilizing voice of reason amidst the highly-charged banter, debates and sometimes conflicts at such meetings.

Battle Honours:

As active and widespread as they are, the Scarlet Sentinels have participated in countless battles all across the Liber Cluster, both from high-profile conflicts to minor skirmishes. Thus it is no surprise they possess an extensive roll of honour to match such a long history of service.

• Mundus Novus Reclamation: Though it is the earliest of the Sentinels' victories, the Reclamation of the Mundus Novus System, culminating in the retaking of the system capital planet of Libertas, and the destruction of Grazfang Umie'crusha's Ork empireis remembered bitterly and celebrated no more by the Chapter. Although a highly successful campaign, recognition for the campaign and the gratitude of the many billions of human slaves liberated would largely be stolen by the Eagles of Glory, in turn sparking the ongoing feud between the two sister Chapters that persists to this day.
• Garandor Campaigns: The young Sentinels would involve themselves heavily in the Imperium's efforts to contain the dangerous xeno races within the Garandor system after it was determined by Adiministratum logisticians that the manpower and effort required for a full purging would deplete Imperial strength in the sector to dangerous levels. Whilst the Mechanicus and Imperial Navy constructed the many listening posts and watchstations need to properly monitor the system the Sentinels performed daring surgical strikes into hostile space to cripple what interstellar capability the Garandor xenos possessed, delaying them until containment was complete.
• Rediscovery of the Albion System: Taking place roughly three Terran months following the Garandor Campaigns, the Sentinels would discover the Albion system, whereupon they set about ruthlessly purging the Ork Clans infesting her Asteroid belts and freeing the human populace from their incessant raids. The Albion Reclamation would bear great fruit for the Sentinels, gifting them with a new Fortress-Monastary as well as a new recruitment base in the Trinity Worlds of Anglin, Caledon and Cambris.
• Eighteen Worlds Crusade: The Scarlet Sentinels initially took to the war against the Sereikei Lions with tremendous enthusiasm, ecstatic to finally mete out retribution for countless raids on Imperial systems and shipping the Lions were behind. This enthusiasum would quickly fade once they were paired with the hated Eagles of Glory by Liber Command for the Barluarte Raid, perhaps hoping the two Chapters would forge news bond of brotherhood in the fires of adversity. Alas, though the Sentinels & Eagles both performed to their utmost ability, inflicting massive losses on the Lions fleet and seizing one of their most vital port worlds, the brooding animosity remained strong as ever and both forces suffered significant casualties for their victory. Following the success of the Raid the Sentinels would use Barluarte as a staging point for further operations into Sereikei territory, including intercepting those renegades that sought to flee the conflict into neighbouring space and safeguarding the Crusade's supply lines. For these honourable actions and many others the Sentinels recieved many commendations from the Liber Conclave following the Crusade's conclusion.
• The March of Ghosts: One of the Chapter's more recent engagements, the Sentinels, alongside the Blades of the Lion and the Lords Inviolate took part in an effort to halt the rampage of the foul Ghoulknights of Throskaar. Alongside their allies, elements from the Sentinels' 5th, 6th and 9th companies engaged the vile traitors, taking significant casualties but claiming no less than four engine kills thanks to their unrelenting firepower and unbending discipline in the heat of battle.

Chapter Organization:

Following in their predecessors footsteps the Sentinels are Codex-compliant, fielding the usual ten companies as laid out by the Codex Astartes with only minor deviations regarding titles & honorifics, such as the title of "Lord Marshall" in lieu of Chapter Master and "Commodore-Captain" replacing the rank of Master of the Fleet.

In groundside combat the Sentinels are known to favour infantry tactics and long-range firepower, backed by mobile outriders and heavy artillery to pummel their foes into submission whilst scout units infiltrate behind enemy lines to perform reconnaissance, sabotage, and when possible, assassination of enemy leaders.

Also of note is the Sentinels' serfs, who, unlike those of other Chapters, are organised into an auxiliary fighting force trained and equipped to defend Sentinel ships in addition to their standard duties as crewmen. These simply named "Shipguards" are highly skilled, employing similiar equipment to that of Scouts and often train together with their Astartes masters. This helps foster a sense of camaraderie between serf and Astartes, as well as allowing Sentinel vessels that might usually contain only a handful of Astartes to punch far above their weight in boarding actions, both on the defense and the attack.

The best example of this, and a tale treasured fondly by Sentinel Shipguards, is from 366.M37 when the Hunter Destroyer Campbeltown was ambushed by the Pirate Sword Frigate Blood Money. It's engines disabled by the larger vessel and it's Astartes Captain dead, Campbeltown'sShipguard mounted a unyielding defence against the Pirate boarding parties while a squad of volunteers secretly stole one of the attacker's transports and snuck across to the Blood Money. Once aboard the squad planted explosive charges at key points around the ship's plasma cores before sneaking back off-ship with the next wave of boarders, minutes later the Blood Money detonated spectacularly, leaving the surviving pirates to be butchered by the Campbeltown's crew. Campbeltown and her crew were later awarded the Imperial Laurel in honour of their bravery and skill.

Fleet Assets:

The Scarlet Sentinels' chapter fleet is perhaps the largest out of all the Liberite Chapters, rivalled only by those of the Blades of the Lion and the Doomsayers. As such, the bulk of the fleet is constantly spread out across the Cluster either undertaking specific missions or performing great sweeping patrol arcs across sectors.

As a result of this restless state of affairs the ships of the Chapter often have long and glorious histories attributed to their names, and it is tradition that whenever a ship is destroyed it's name is passed on to it's replacement, if possible with a piece of the predecessor incorporated into the successor, that way the vessel's legacy of honourable service may symbolically continue.

Some of the Sentinel's most notable vessels include:

• Conqueror: A Strike Cruiser known for it's legendary (and to some Sentinels, wasted) sacrifice to protect the planet of Libertas during it's reclamation by the Imperium. The Conqueror's Captain, Thomas Beckham, ordered the damaged ship's evacuation before charging the Cruiser into the heart of the enemy fleet and detonating it's Plasma Core, annihilating the enemy flagship and winning the battle.
• Ark Imperial: An ancient and storied Battle Barge that has been with the Sentinels since their founding, the Ark Imperial has served in countless conflicts, most notably the Reclamation of the Liber Cluster, the Garandor Campaigns, the March of Ghosts, and the Eighteen Worlds Crusade. It currently has the distinction of being the chosen flagship of Commodore-Captain Faranis Drake, the Scarlet Sentinels' Master of the Fleet.
• Warspite: The oldest surviving Strike Cruiser in the fleet, Warspite has recently finished an huge retrofitting at the Dockyards of Geius Prime after being nearly crippled in an ambush by an Ork Loota Clan. Though victorious, the Warspite suffered terrible damage and required a full overhaul that would have taken several years save for the assistance of the Mechanicus, who offered to not only rebuild the ship but significantly upgrade her systems in order to repay an old debt to the Sentinels. Now extremely upgunned, Warspite has been tenatively reclassified as a Battle Cruiser and her crew is eager for revenge against their Ork foes.
• Golden Hind: Lost to a Hrud Ambush while on patrol, the Strike Cruiser's crew sent out a distress call before being overwhelmed. A Blackjaw Kindred ship was first to respond and slaughtered the remaining Hrud, but when more Sentinels arrived the Blackjaw Patriach claimed the Hind's captain had awarded it to them as he died. Skeptical, the Sentinels demanded the ship's return. Adamant in what Kindred law deemed his rightful claim but unwilling to risk bloodshed, the Patriach jumped the Hind into the Warp rather than risk a fight. The Hind later saw service in the Eighteen Worlds Crusade as part of the Kindred's fleet attacking Zavatista, and presumably was taken with them when the Kindred later went renegade.
• Campbeltown: A Hunter Destroyer ambushed by Pirates, Campbeltown's Captain, the sole Astartes aboard, was killed in the enemy's opening salvo that left the vessel's engines crippled and open to boarding. However, Campbeltown's Shipguard held off the attackers long enough for a squad of volunteers to sneak over to the Pirate ship and plant explosives in it's engine core, destroying it. The entire crew was awarded the Imperial Laurel for their actions.

The Sentinels Strike Cruiser Invincible Will surveys a newly discovered world alongside two Navy escorts.

Recruitment:

The Scarlet Sentinels maintains self-sufficent Keeps in remote locations upon each of the Trinity Worlds that, come the time of trials every fifteen years, see hundreds of youths brave the harrowing journey there in hopes of becoming one of the Emperor's Angels of Death. Women, while not as common as men, are equally welcome to test themselves as though they cannot become Astartes they are more then eligible to join the ranks of the Chapter Shipguard, indeed, some of the finest Captains of the Sentinels' fleet have been proud daughters of Albion, fierce and cunning. This mixed-gender crew means many Sentinel vessels are home to entire familial dynasties of Serfs, some of which can trace their ancestry all the way back to the Sentinels' first intake of recruits from the Albion system, making these dynasties heir to a rich history of naval tradition and honourable service they proudly continue.

Those that survive the harrowing journey to the Keeps must then face the many murderous tests that will determine whether they are worthy to become Neophytes. Some succeed, others fall, while the few that live but fail the tests face a choice, they may return home or they may become a Chapter Serf. Regardless of their decision these failed aspirants are treated with honour for how far they have come, as each serve the Sovereign Emperor in their own way, be it attending to his Angels or raising the next generation of recruits.

Once the trials are finished and the final aspirants have been chosen, they are then transported via Thunderhawk from their homeworlds to the White Hall, the Sentinels' Fortress-Monastary, to begin their augmentation.

Chapter Colours:

Chapter Colours

For many decades after their founding the Scarlet Sentinels had no Chapter Colours of their own, only the dull unpainted grey ceramite of their Power Armour, as they had vowed to follow the example of the Legions of old and not adopt any colours until they found a new home worthy of them, and with it, their new identity. So it was the as-yet unnamed Sentinels plyed the stars until the discovered the Albion system and the inhabited Trinity Worlds within. As the marines studied the native people of each world, the Lord Marshall of the time became aware of a old custom on Anglin that would end his Chapter's quest for identity.

As the home of many squabbling empires, Anglin was no stranger to war and with the advent of blackpowder weapons metal armour had become more of a hinderance than a help. So to save coin that could be used to produce firearms, plate and chainmail were replaced with cheaper fabric uniforms dyed with that power's respective colours. At the same time, coastal raids on port towns by both Pirates and enemy Soldiers were becoming a more and more commonplace occurance thanks to cannon-armed tallships, who favoured approaching their prey quietly in the dead of night before opening up with their guns.

All this meant that Garrision sentries had to be exceptionally vigilant to detect such incoming ships and warn against them, but also made them important targets for raider sharpshooters, who would seek to pick off the sentries with silent crossbows before they could ring the alarm bells. However some sentries became famous for managing to alert their townships of attacks despite suffering multiple wounds, the survivors returning to duty wearing their bloodstained uniforms as a sign of pride and defiance, earning them the nickname of "Redcoats," and it became a tradition to dye the jackets of sentries in the "Heroes' Scarlet."

Inspired by these tales and seeing parallels between the sentries and his Chapter, the Lord Marshall made his decision, they would pattern their colours after the sentries' uniforms and take up the Heroes' Scarlet. They would stand sentinel over the Emperor's domain in the Liber Cluster, a thin red line between the enemies of Man and the citizens of the Imperium.

They were the Scarlet Sentinels, and they would be second to none.

Battle Standards & Chapter Banners:

The White Trident & Hoplon Shield of the Scarlet Sentinels, the Trident is an ancient Terran symbol of Naval power that declares the Chapter's fearsome prowess in the void whilst the Shield represents the Sentinels' self-appointed duty as protectors of the Imperium's citizens and holdings within the Liber Cluster.

Battle Honors, Relics, Decorations & Awards:

"Always remember brothers, your wargear is like the sea. Show them the proper respect and they'll serve you well, fail to do so and they'll turn on you when you need them most." ~Captain Garand, 3rd Company, Master of the Arsenal.

The Staff of the Navigator: A unique Force Staff belonging to the Sentinels' former Chief Librarian, Lucernius the Navigator, who modified it while aboard the Striker Cruiser Furious when it became lost in the Warp while pursuing raiders. The wild chase pushed the ship's Navigators to the point of expiration, leaving the Furious stranded. Knowing the journey home would take centuries without Warp travel, Lucernius modified his Staff with tech taken from the Navigators' stations so he could more accurately perceive the warp tides, making safe "hops" into the warp possible and cutting their journey home down to mere years.

In battle the Staff of the Navigator provides a Librarian far more stable control of his own warp energies, as well as alerting him to any sudden warp changes around him that might indicate daemonic activity, psychic tricks at play, or even imminent teleporter assault, it also allows the Librarian to more easily dispel enemy psychic attacks.

The Sentinel's Retort: Jokingly referred to by some Sentinels as "Touché," the Sentinel's Retort is an ancient Storm Shield patterned after the Boarding Mantlets ubiquitous amongst the Scarlet Sentinels, albeit far more advanced. In addition to the standard Power Field, the Sentinel's Retort is equipped with an advanced archaeotech grav-generator that, like a conversion field, converts the force of an enemy's attack into energy. Unlike conversion fields however, the Sentinel's Retort converts that energy into a bone-breaking wave of gravametric force that is directed back at the attacker, turning their own strength against them as the wave buckles armour, shatters bone and rupture organs.

The Voidwalker's Plate: Created by the Tech Priests of Geius Prime for the Sentinel's part in liberating their world from Orkish siege during the Liber Reclamation Crusade, the Voidwalker Plate is an imposing suit of artificer armour with a variety of special features. The armour has a built-in Teleport Homer, is completely Void-hardened and features a complex set of miniature grav-generators that can lighten the armour to move with a swiftness and agility that would usually be beyond a power-armoured individual.

Combat Doctrine: (Contributed by Tiberius Cato)

The Scarlet Sentinels have changed the tide of many of their battles through their naval superiority. Nearly all campaigns are focused around eliminating the enemy navy first and foremost, proceeded by creating a blockade around the planet. This ensures nobody comes or goes without first meeting the big guns of the Sentinels' navy. Once a blockade has been established orbital bombardments are often conducted to hit key enemy fortifactions, creating opportunities for ground forces to come in and make short work of the remaining enemy forces. The Scarlet Sentinels are also reknowned for their discipline with the holy bolter and prefer to engage enemies from a distance rather than engage in barbaric close combat. As such, it is uncommon for the Sentinels to deploy assault squads armed with melee weapons.

Battle Cry:

"Scarlet Sentinels!" Response- "Second to none!"

Local Rituals:

The Feast of Blades: Like all Imperial Fists successors the Scarlet Sentinels participate in the time-honoured tournament known as the Feast of Blades every one-hundred years to foster good relations and brotherly camaraderie between those of Dorn's lineage. Regrettably, while the Sentinels have yet to win one of these tournaments they have come close on several occasions, the closest by far being at the 731st Feast of Blades, where the Sentinel Champion, Edwen Braddock, made it all the way to the final match before being defeated in an hour-long duel by the Black Templar representative, Reinhardt Schtauffen.

Though the Sentinels stay true to ideals of the Feast for the most part, all such notions of friendly competition and bond-building disappear on the rare occasions Sentinel champions have been unfortunate enough (or lucky, as some say) to face representatives of the hated Eagles of Glory in the arena. This has lead to several incidents in the past where combatants have continued fighting long past the point they should have yielded or passed out, leading to officials having to physically intervene before potentially fatal damage could occur.

Regardless of these incidents the Sentinels never miss a Feast and are still well-respected amongst their brothers in the wider Imperium. They continue to dream of the day when they might finally triumph over their fellows and become the first to bring the prized Dornsblade home to the Liber Cluster, there to await the next Feast of Blades, held within the Sentinels' own walls.

The Blooding: An old tradition whose origins can be found in the Chapters' early days searching for an identity of their own, the Blooding forbids Scouts from wearing the full Heroes' Scarlet heraldry of the Chapter until they "earn their colours" by being promoted to full Battle-Brother status and receiving the Black Carapace. Until then a Scout's carapace armour is left unpainted save for the left shoulder pauldron, which retains the Chapter symbol for ease of identification. Only Scout Sergeants, being full-fledged Battle-Brothers themselves, wear the Heroes' Scarlet.

Char: A drink brewed from the leaves of a plant of the same name native to the Trinity Worlds, Char is widely believed by Albionites to have a fortifying effect upon the constitution as well as boosting mental acuity. Highly popular across all levels of Albion society from peasants to kings, Char is especially popular amongst soldiers who come together on the eve of battle to drink a toast to their fallen comrades and future glory. The Scarlet Sentinels have adopted this tradition via cultural assimilation since taking the Trinity Worlds as their recruitment grounds, it is now traditional for the Sentinels to offer Char to visiting dignitaries from other Imperial organisations & institutions, though few can stomach the particularly bitter brew the Sentinels favour, save possibly other Astartes.

Beliefs:

"To some of our cousins having a clean blade at the end of battle is shameful, to a Sentinel, it's proof my Drill Sergeants and I are doing our jobs properly." ~Captain Price, 10th Company, Master of Recruits.

The Scarlet Sentinels' beliefs revolve around the concept of themselves as the Imperium's guardians, as their forebears in the Imperial Fists were the sentinels of Terra so too are the Sentinels the defenders of the Liber Cluster and it's citizens. This philosophy has led the Sentinels to adopt the role of watchmen, dutifully patrolling Imperial shipping lanes and territorial borders where more haughty Astartes might see such mundane duties as beneath them. The Sentinels also regularly act as escorts for Imperial Reclamation Fleets venturing into unexplored and/or dangerous territory, which garners them much acclaim and respect from other Imperial institutions.

In battle the Sentinels believe that the best way to fight is to eliminate the foe before they can draw close and utilise their numerical superiority against the Sentinels' more limited numbers, this belief having stemmed from the rising supremacy of firearms and other projectile weapons on the Sentinels' recruitment worlds. Though the sons of Albion are by no means afraid to fight the foe face-to-face they see close combat as a chaotic, inefficient affair that often bogs down the battle, merely delaying the inevitable at best and at worse, giving the foe time to escape or bring the rest of his forces to bear while the Astartes are tied up. Therefore the Sentinels practise their infamously lethal bolter drill with near-religious devotion, and enjoy making use of their heavier firepower to devastate the foe before casually sweeping up the remnants. A favourite tactic of Sentinel commanders is when faced with enemies who seek to engage in melee, Tactical Squads will execute calm, well-ordered withdrawals, peppering the oncoming foe with bolt rounds as they are lured into the teeth of other Sentinel units to be butchered in the prepared crossfire.

Where firearms are generally held in higher regard than melee weapons on the battlefield, swords are usually only employed against the fiercest opponents the enemy has to offer. To have a Sentinel choose to draw his blade to fight you is an honour few foes have lived to boast about, the Chapter having inherited their forebears' tradition of settling internal disputes via honour duels between battle-brothers. As such it is common practise for new recruits to bring a blade from their homeworld with them upon induction into the Chapter, ranging from Anglin sabres and Caledonian claymores to Cambrian longswords.

Gene-seed:

The Scarlet Sentinels are proud direct descendants of the Imperial Fists and the Emperor's Praetorian Rogal Dorn, and like their forebears are known for their iron discipline and unbending willpower. The Sentinels' gene-seed is stable with no real flaws save for the missing Betcher's Gland and Sus-an Membrane characteristic of the Dorn gene-line.

The Sentinels treat their gene-seed with the same reverence as any other Chapter, if perhaps a little more than most given their more immediate relation to the Imperial Fists and their gene-sire. Fittingly, the sons of Albion are fiercely proud of their heritage and equally protective of their genetic legacy, going to great lengths to ensure that no matter what catastrophe may visit itself upon them they can quickly and efficiently reconstitute their numbers without consequence.

Almost all Scarlet Sentinel gene-seed stores are secreted away in the Great Vault of the White Hall's Apothecarium, although there are also smaller gene-stores hidden under each Chapter Keep on the Trinity Worlds. The Great Vault itself is made out of layered Adamantium and Ceramite plating and features a built-in Void Shield generator and can even be jettisoned in case of an emergency, where upon the Vault's machine spirit will pilot the Vault safely to whichever of the Trinity Worlds is closest at the time for safe collection.

Additionally, given the remote and far-flung locations of many Sentinel missions the threat of gene-seed being lost is higher than most, thus by edict of the Lord Marshall all strikeforces have a small (usually three to five) cadre of Apothcaries on hand to recover as much gene-seed as possible, and all battle-brothers are trained in the use of Apothecarium preservation containers when no Apothecary is available.

Champions Of The Chapter:

Lucernius the Navigator: A legend amongst the Chapter, Lucernius became renowned for his role in the return of the long-presumed lost Strike Cruiser Furious after it became stranded in unknown territory with it's navigators dead from over-exertion. Lucernius guided the Furious on it's seven year journey back to Imperial lines whilst charting multiple star systems and stellar anomalies of potential interest to the Imperium. Upon returning home Lucernius was declared a hero by the Liber Conclave and promoted to the rank of Epistolary. Later he would re-trace the Furious's voyage, acting as the Lord Marshall's adviser for the Reclamation Crusade's first campaign into the Englica Subsector.

Lucernius met his end nearly two centuries later, ironically aboard the Furious, when it was ambushed on the border of Warpstorm Id'ilmar by a monstrous daemonship. Caught in the vessel's grasping tendrils with hordes of machine-devils boarding her, Furious would have been lost had Lucernius not engaged the daemonship's spirit in a titanic psychic duel that slew the corrupt entity, the rotting ship tearing itself apart without the daemon to sustain it. Tragically, Lucernius himself died with his foe, giving his life to save his brothers. His body was swiftly returned to Albion where it was laid to rest within the White Hall's hallowed crypts, and a great statue was raised in the Halls of Honour to inspire future Sentinels with the legend of Lucernius the Navigator.

-More to be added later.

Notable Engagements: (Contributed by Tiberius Cato)

The Liberation of Libertas:
In the early days of the second Liberite Invasion, there were few worlds that still belonged to the Imperium. Many had been reconquered by the xenos species that had originated there, or had been overrun by newer threats. One such world was Libertas, the key to claiming the Mundus Novus system, which had been invaded by Orks. The system had been home to many imperial worlds of great importance, among these worlds were Chevalius, a world known to possess a great deal of Knight armour. Also among these worlds was the forge-world Geius Primus, which had formerly produced much of the weaponry used by Imperial forces.

The system was set to be one of the first major acquisitions of the Imperium in the second invasion. As such, two chapters of the Adeptus Astartes had been assigned to claim it. The first were the mighty Scarlet Sentinels, masters of naval warfare and cold discipline, few enemies could match their prowess in orbital warfare and even fewer could challenge their resolve. The second was the relentless Eagles of Glory, unrivalled in both manpower and sheer firepower on the ground. This was seen to be the perfect combination for invading and claiming worlds in the name of the Imperium, one chapter to decimate enemy fleets in orbit above worlds, and the other to annihilate the ground forces of the enemy. The combination had proved to be quite successful, for many of the missions the pair had been assigned to were handled with the utmost efficiency.

The conflict started with the Scarlet Sentinels emerging from a warp jump and bombarding enemy forces with all manners of naval weaponry, skillfully executing many manoeuvres to avoid enemy fire and trap them, the Sentinels had emerged from the combat with minimal losses. This paved the way for the Eagles of Glory to initiate planetfall. The Eagles had deployed en mass, fielding almost half of the chapter to combat the greenskin forces. They easily decimated the Ork fortifications with the sheer firepower from their many predator tanks and drop pod assaults. Though the Eagles did not fair quite as well as the Sentinels, losing multiple tanks and six squads of battle brothers, they nonetheless conquered the planet for the Imperium. The sole surviving hive of the conflict, Columbus, venerated the Eagles and showered them with all manners of praise and worship.

Unbeknownst to them, the ground war had been the lesser part of the battle, the real struggle was fought in orbit above Libertas. After defeating the ork fleet stationed above Libertas, the Scarlet Sentinels had wisely set about creating a blockade. Mere minutes after the Eagles made planetfall a massive fleet of traitorous guardsmen, led by a vanguard of Chaos Hades and Hellfire class cruisers had emerged from the warp near Libertas. The fate of the planet was firmly thrust into the hands of the Sentinels at that point.

The Sentinels valiantly fended off the host of Chaos forces intent on defeating the imperial invaders, deploying all of their Thunderhawks to engage in all-out orbital warfare and Caestus Assault Rams for boarding actions. During the fighting the Strike Cruiser "Conqueror" had suffered severe damage and her captain, Thomas Beckham, ordered all crew members to evacuate the ship. In a final act of faithful service to the Emperor, Beckham rammed the Conqueror into the starboard side of the enemy fleet's sole capital ship, and proceeded to manually overload her plasma core, causing a massive explosion that engulfed the capital ship alongside many others. Without clear direction, the Chaos forces had lost all co-ordination and were easily crushed beneath the heel of the vengeful Astartes. Astonishingly, very few losses were incurred by the Sentinels -excluding the loss of The Conqueror-losing only a few escorts. Their superiority in the void and the unbending discipline they possessed in all aspects of war had seized victory for the Imperium.

At the following conclave, word from Libertas of the exploits of the Eagles had greatly influenced the decision made by the council present there. As such, Libertas was to be presented to the Eagles as a reward for their valiant actions. Enraged by the complete ignorance of the people of Libertas to the his brothers' valiant defence, the Lord Marshall of the Scarlet Sentinels promptly took his escorts and marched out of the conclave, from that point on becoming bitter rivals of the Eagles of Glory.

Edited March 14, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

THE ANGELS EXTULTANT

 

 

The Angels Exultant were believed to have been created from Blood Angels gene-seed. They share the predisposition for bloodshed and close quarters fighting often seen in the sons of Sanguinius. To those familiar with the successors of that lineage however, they seemed strange. The flaw did not seem to manifest as strongly in these marines than in their forebears. Every battle group contained at least one chaplain and often several human priests whose chants in glory of the Emperor seemed to unite and direct the soldiers around him. The black rage seemed absent even though the red thirst was clearly present.

 

The truth was far stranger. The Angels Exultant did indeed suffer from their own form of the black rage. In three ways it was different, firstly the chantings and glories to the God emperor seemed to subdue the rage enough to form a functional fighting force that had slightly more grasp at tactics than run at the enemy as quickly as possible and kill them with your chainswords. Secondly, the rage was not a permanent change but a transient one, though no one could be sure when it would end. Thirdly however was far less fortuitous, as it occurred far more frequently than even perhaps the flesh tearers. These all necessitated the training of the most zealous of recruits into the large chaplaincy at the core of the chapter. The most zealous of those who failed to pass the rigors of becoming a marine instead of being made a serf or a servitor would often be inducted into their priesthood.

 

When they reached the Liber Cluster the Angels Exultant were quickly set upon by a renegade force. For some unknowable reason the renegades made a point of targeting the chaplains and priests of the chapter. This targeted destruction often would leave insufficient priesthoods to maintain the facade the Angels Exultant had carefully cultivated. Sometimes squads or whole battle groups would have to be destroyed from space, alongside any allies who had witnessed the devolution of those on the ground into flesh eating monsters.

 

Greatly weakened by this enemy’s attacks, in addition to the normal losses accrued as they tried to continue in their reclamation of the Liber Cluster, the renegades finally decided to strike in force. A great space hulk tore out of the warp and opened fire on the Angels Exultant fleet. Finally though fortune smiled on the Angels. The Doomsayers came and with their aid the enemy was routed. Expressing their thanks to their timely saviors, the Angels Exultant decided to follow the enemy to their base of operations, which had been revealed via a joint boarding action of both Doomsayers and Angels Exultant battle brothers.

 

When they arrived on the planet Arrax, the Angels found little but red sand and ancient ruins. However, searching the planet with their scanners showed that it was filled with lifesigns. Seeking to end this enemy once and for all, the entire remains of the chapter deployed all across the planet in order to quickly root out and destroy the enemy. However, the enemy had made pacts with the strange xenos that inhabited this planet.These creatures, the Sakis were essentially living sand, and thus the Angels Exultant were entirely unable to notice their presence, even directly below their feet. Meanwhile, the renegades were performing a ritual under the earth. At its height, the Sakis targeted the chaplains and priests in sacrifice to Khorne. When the ritual completed the rage surged through the Angels Exultant and hundreds of heralds of Khorne were summoned to the planet. These daemons perverted the holy chants that had once kept the raging Angels servants to the emperor into blasphemous glories to the lord of skulls. Those few Angels Exultant who had retained their sanity were quickly slain by their frothing brethren.

 

The remaining renegades(perhaps including a member of the fallen to tie in with the Blades) came forth and took over the chants of hate as the daemons returned to the warp. They lead the Angels back onto the very ships which had brought them to the planet and flew away. They have plagued the Liber Cluster ever since, though their ultimate goals are still yet to be understood by the forces of the Imperium.

 

Geneseed

Under the curse of the Black Rage, even moderated as it was, the Angels Exultant never appeared to follow the traditional behaviour of Adeptus Astartes, even for sons of Sanguinius. And indeed they were never intended to. As has been speculated, the unusual characteristics of their geneseed and resulting curses did represent an attempt to alter the legacy of the Sanguinius lineage. But unlike the theorised attempt to cure the curse in the case of the Lamenters, in the case of the Angels the unknown parties behind the chapter’s creation sought to more efficiently weaponise the Black Rage.

 

The Black Rage is the result of the psychic legacy of Sanguinius’s death, interacting with genetic markers in the Blood Angel geneseed. The designers of the Angels Exultant sought to harness the extra strength, speed and aggression that comes upon a son of Sanguinius with the Black Rage, by moderating the biggest drawbacks associated with the condition – namely that the ferocious rage is so intense that the marine becomes incapable of following battlefield direction, and that the condition is usually permanent and an afflicted marine extremely impractical outside of actual combat. If those two drawbacks could be addressed, then the resulting chapter would be an unstoppable force.

 

Like so many of the attempts made during the 21^st Founding to alter geneseed, the attempt was not entirely successful. The careful modifications to the geneseed originally did not appear to have produced any change to the way the Black Rage manifested itself. It was when the architects considered the impact of the psychic imprint of the primarch’s death that they found the missing piece of their puzzle.

 

Observers have noticed that unlike many other sons of Sanguinius, the Angels Exultant did not appear to make use of a librarius department. So far as anyone outside the chapter knew, they had never seen any of battle-psykers amongst the ferocious chanting hordes. The reality was much more unusual. Like all of Sanguinius’s get, psychic potential runs strongly through the Angels, but has been deliberately and uniquely repurposed.

 

The Angel Exultant geneseed enhances psychic potential, but also bends those powers in a very specific way. All marines successfully implanted gain a slight increase in their psychic strength, but most develop a specific form of psychic vampirism, where they draw psychic power from those around them. A few become much more powerful and in another chapter would become the librarians of the force. In the Angels however, they undergo unusual and highly specialised training. All of their psychic potential is trained to act as beacons of influence over their brothers. It was discovered that by projecting a psychic aura of fanatical devotion to the Emperor and the current mission, they were able to interfere with the psychic imprint that normally triggers the Black Rage and make afflicted marines more pliable. More importantly, it was also found that by producing an aura of calm and control, they could assist their brothers to regain their lucidity.

It was, of course, not that simple. The ability to influence their brothers only worked effectively if the psychic receptiveness of the regular marines was further enhanced. It was discovered that the most effective way for this to occur was for a marine to “slave” themselves to one of the more powerful psykers by drinking some of their blood directly from the psyker’s veins. With their “master’s” blood resonating in their veins, they became much more receptive to the controlling aura he produced.

 

This came at a cost. Ingesting the blood was found to almost always trigger the Black Rage immediately. After this occurred, the Black Rage would never leave the affected marine, effectively suppressed out of battle by the psyker’s aura, combined with focusing chants and willpower, but ready to reassert itself the moment these factors were removed. The marines’ psychic receptiveness meant that the chanting and willpower became more effective when done en masse.

The other major cost was that the specialised training in influencing their peers constrained and limited the power and flexibility of the Angels psykers. If they ceased projecting, their chapter would fall to pieces around them. As their minds became adjusted to projecting either the enraging aura or the calming aura at all times, their psychic gifts twisted until that was the only way they could manifest their powers.

 

Recognising that much of this would be considered suspect, the leadership of the Angels Exultant rearranged their chapter to allow them to function without arousing suspicion. The psykers were formed into a form of chaplaincy, rather than the traditional librarius. Their function was, after all, now much closer to that of a chaplain, managing the Black Rage in their chapter. It was found that surrounding themselves with human psykers, similarly trained and conditioned, made their projections much more effective again, and this became common practice. To conceal the unsavoury nature of their activities, their efforts were always portrayed as raising zealotry and burning faith, rather than psychic control. Indeed, as the practice became established and mired in greater tradition and doctrine, it’s possible that even the chaplains themselves no longer fully understood how they controlled their brothers – simply that the trained patterns of “thought” in which they were instructed worked to make their brothers functional and deadly in the Emperor’s name. Certainly, by the time they arrived and established themselves in the Liber Cluster, no-one in the Cluster suspected the true nature of the Angel’s chaplains and their ministry to their chapter.

 

It is not known whether the traitors who engineered the downfall of the Angels knew of this potential weakness, and that was why they targeted the chaplains. Equally, it could be that the daemons of Khorne who appeared to have been involved in the downfall could detect the hated aura of psykers and directed the sources of it be exterminated. But when all of the chaplains of the chapter were executed, the Black Rage immediately reasserted itself over the vast majority of the chapter. Combined with the heightened suggestibility brought about by their geneseed and psychic imprinting, it was no wonder that they swiftly fell under the sway of the Blood God.

[Conn Eremon]

THE BLACKJAW KINDRED
“Honor, that's a mighty thin blanket 'gainst de chill of de grave.”

 

   

Perhaps more than any other Chapter, the Kindred have been shaped and molded by the Liber Cluster. Although Imperial records mentioned three fleet based Astartes Chapters (the Hell Tigers, Chevaliers, and the Knives of Guilliman) were attached to the initial settlement expedition, it was still a shock when the second wave of Imperium forces who entered the Maloccio system received orders to declare their identity or be destroyed on standard Astartes frequencies.

 

It was the first, but far from the last time this unorthodox Astartes contingent would baffle their newly arrived brethren.

 

Although initially hailing the new arrivals as a respite from their centuries long guerilla war against "greenpig" and "blacksoul" forces, it was not long before the relationship soured, due to matters ranging from the Kin's divergent battle doctrine (which makes heavy use of mortal specialists and salvaged Imperial Guard vehicles) to the archaic honor codes, superstition, and local folklore that has melded with their Chapter Cult (cults?).

 

The Kin see themselves as war-shamans, mediaries between the Emperor and His Primarchs and the people of the Cluster. The "Ten Heavenly Lords" are revered as mercurial and capricious deities, who must be placated by votive offerings and ritual before they will bless their creations. 

 

Furthermore, the Primarchs as venerated by the Kin have little in common with the figures from Imperial history. For example, Roboute Guilliman is worshipped as the War King, a peerless fighter in scarlet and bronze armor who forged a great empire with the edge of his sword, while Leman Russ is admired as a wandering philosopher mystic, patron of the arts, healing, and those who practice "white sorcery."

 

While the Kin's divergences have led for some to call them to be declared Excommunicate Traitoris and wiped out, the Chapter's current leader, Grandfather Baptiste, has formed a strong working relationship with the Inquisitorial elements present, who make good use of the Kin's local knowledge.

 

Likewise, the Kin show an unusual deference to the Conflagrators, and often follow that bitter Chapter's lead in both council sessions and on the battlefield.

 

It is theorized that this is because in their pantheon, Vulkan is a grim figure who rules over the part of the afterlife where the unworthy dead atone for their sins with centuries of fiery torment and drudge labor before being allowed into the Emperor's paradise, and they see the Conflagrators as living messengers from the tyrannical Hammerer.

 

Organisation of the Chapter of the Blackjaw Kindred

 

The Cults of the Nine permeate the Blackjaw Kindred through and through. More than just a belief system, it influences their behavior, their outlook, and their wars. Though the Kin worship the Nine undivided, as a pantheon of near equals, the Chapter’s unique structure is riddled with unit types that are in clear reliance to one of their God-Progenitors over the others. Russ, the arcane yet wisest of the Nine, stands foremost in their eyes, however among the Circles of Kin each of the Nine sees expression. Bearing the heraldic cross upon the shield of Dorn, Kindred Dreadnoughts, the heroic fallen, have an intimate, but exclusive connection with their chosen favored progenitor. These legendary warriors, their biological bodies broken and shackled to mighty war-engines, have felt the stony hand of Dorn upon their very souls, guiding them back from the Shadowlands to fight alongside their brothers once more. 

The Circles are not what would be considered Codex adherent. There are no reserve Circles, all are battle-ready and proportioned according to their Patriarch’s wishes, and often by the Patriarch’s chosen cult. Such is the case with the 7th Circle, led by Patriarch Tréhoart, a former Breacher sergeant that openly bears the jagged gold symbols of the Khan, the merciless mistress of the currents of fate, even after his ascension to Patriarch, when the other Patriarchs assumed he would forsake the Judge in the Deep for the White Mystic, the favored Russ. Under his guidance, the 7th Circle is particularly suited to void warfare and boarding actions. Though the 7th Circle is not alone in its ceaseless pursuit of war, far from home, not all Circles venture far from the hearth. By tradition, the 2nd Circle’s Patriarch is selected among the Kin who identify most strongly with the Lion. The 2nd Circle rarely travels far from the Kindred’s chosen worlds, tasked by its own predilections to patrol and safeguard them. It is the 2nd Circle that locates and selects potential Chapter inductees, as well as quelling unrest and defending them from outside attack. However, should an enemy strike and disappear before the 2nd Circle could arrive in defense, then their Patriarch will order the pursuit and systematic destruction of the foe, and terrible is their vengeance to behold.

 

COMBAT DOCTRINE OF THE BLACKJAW KINDRED

As with almost every other aspect of the Kin's existence, the method in which they fight their wars has been influenced heavily by their long isolation within the Liber Cluster, and their veneration of the Primarchs as the Nine Heavenly Lords. 

As each of their fifteen Circles (roughly equivalent to a Codex Company) varies in size and disposition according to the whims of its Patriarch, it is more helpful to discuss their organization in terms of the specialist formations organized around the cults of the Nine. 

The average Kin battle brother carries a bolt pistol and a "machanoir", a chainsword variation which has more in common with a polearm. The "teeth" make up a far smaller portion of the overall weapon than the standard chainsword, and the durable hafts are used to parry blows, trap weapons or limbs, and club at an opponent in order to set up a kill strike with the toothed section. It is believed that this weapon was created to deal with the Kin lacking the facilities to manufacture chainweapon blades in the quantities necessary to fully equip a standard Chapter. Likewise, the semi-automatic bolt pistol expends rounds much slower than a bolter. The Kindred's tactical squad equivalents typically fight in loose, catch as catch can formations, with an emphasis on darting forward, landing a quick strike with a machanoir (or a point blank shot from a pistol pressed directly against the target) and then quickly retreating back to the safety of one's own lines.

These forces are usually bolstered by Cuirassiers, champions who honor the Battle King above all others. Noted marksmen, these warriors are allowed to wield modified bolters, combi weapons, and power blades as they compete with one another to perform great deeds in Guilliman's name. They may be easily recognized by their ornate red and bronze helms and armor, which each warrior farther decorates with his own unique heraldry so that their fellows (and the watching Primarch) will easily recognize which hero is achieving great feats of arms. 

 

During the Silence, the newly formed Saneslau Mechanicus severed all ties with nearly every other Imperial faction in the Cluster, including the devastated Chapters that would later become the Blackjaw Kindred.

As a result, the Kin have evolved into an almost entirely infantry force which relies on drop pods or jet packs for battlefield mobility, and such Land Raiders, Vindicators, and so forth as they have serce more as rolling shrines to the Nine than actual weapons of war.

This deficiency is partially offset by the large amounts of Tactical Dreadnaught Armor the Kin posses, with each Circle possessing its own cadres of Terminator specialists.

The Stormbringers, an all Terminator cult spread across several Circles, seem to have had their genesis in an attempt to compensate for a lack of armored vehicles by modifying Terminator armor to serve in an artillery support role. Devotees of Ferrus Manus, these hulking masters of ordinance support their brethren's hit and run tactics with devastating barrages of missiles. 

 

Grandfather Baptiste - Chapter Master of the Blackjaw Kindred.

 

Wargear:  Grandfather Wolf's Blessed Beard.

 

All devout followers of Grandather Wolf aspire to grow and show off a mighty beard. 

 

Grandfather Baptiste has always sported a beard all the way from inception into the chapter as an aspirant.  As he advanced through the ranks and gained his exalted station he grew his beard according to chapter doctrines and the beliefs of the followers of Grandfather Wolf, so much so that now he sports a mighty beard, so mighty that he could bludgeon a fully grown Grox to death!

 

The Blessed Beard has never known the purposeful touch of a razor although it has suffered in melee more than a few times, it has always grown back.  It has even grown back in the space of a night such is the power of the Blessed Beard! 

 

His beard can at times become unruly and it has to be wrenched, beaten and threatened verbally with the threat of pulling out!  Grandfather Baptiste mantains his force of will over his Blessed Beard and it serves him well as a fine example of virility and power, so much so that even as his hair grows to silver his Blessed Beard can still be shown to be black as pitch.

 

Addendum:  Life in the Liber Cluster is many fold, through the divine powers of the Primarchs Grandfather Baptiste has unknowingly gained mastery over the attentions of a Beard Squig.

[Conn Eremon]

THE SONS OF CALDERON

“We stand in ironclad!”

 

 

Many considerations that often shaped decisions, particularly in the selection of gene-seed progenitors in a Founding of Space Marines, were cast aside for the 21^st Founding for the sake of perfecting the gene-tech from whence it came. Though no such tampering was done with the gene-seed of the Sons of Calderon, another consideration was dismissed. Often progenitor Chapters are chosen for their stability, purity and accountability. Some Chapters, most famously the Space Wolves, are for this reason rarely, if ever, chosen. For the retaking of the Liber Cluster, there was only one Chapter that could provide the needed character. A Chapter that has, for all intents and purposes, never given up on the mythic Great Crusade. The Sons of Calderon Chapter was therefore born from the Black Templars Chapter.

 

However, the Imperium could ill afford the Sons of Calderon learning too much of the overly independent ways of the Black Templars. The Sons instead spent an inordinate amount of time segregated with the Mechanicum during their formative years of creation. This perhaps might be seen as a mistake, for instead the Sons became attached to and influenced by a different, but equally “overly independent” Imperial faction, the Martian Priesthood.

 

The Sons of Calderon have perhaps outgrown the typical ostracization suffered by other scions of Mars, for they have forged close ties of brotherhood with the other Chapters. Nonetheless, they retain the deepest bond with the Mechanicum of the Liber Cluster, most particularly the Saneslau Mechanicum. This relationship has been of great benefit to the Chapter, granting them some of the best equipment and most well-kept armour and ships of any other Chapter within the Liber Cluster, including rare, archaic weaponry not seen in such quantities since the Great Crusade.

 

It is a relationship of mutual benefit, for the Sons of Calderon assist the Mechanicum in their searches for lost tech. The Martian brotherhood kept careful records of all that went into the Liber Cluster in the initial settlement waves, and they were eager to reclaim them in the second invasion. Though it was known with exacting detail what was funneled into the Liber Cluster, where those materials went once inside was far more obscure. Some of it was found when the Imperium reclaimed surviving human worlds, but much remains lost among the densely packed stars. The Sons can often be seen escorting the Reclamation Fleets, or even plunging far ahead of them, in search of lost Forge Worlds, many of which having gained legends of mythical proportions, the truths of which the Sons are privileged to know.

 

It is notable that in spite of this relationship, the Sons of Calderon have never shown signs of holding to the Omnissian Creed, and instead appear to be devoted worshipers of the God-Emperor, something of a rarity among Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. Their faith has given them great courage under fire, and a particular hatred for Chaos Marine Warbands. Many of the fighting companies of the Sons of Calderon are dedicated to their Oaths of Vengeance. Any such company under an Oath of Vengeance is single-mindedly dedicated to the exposure and eradication of a particular band of Traitor Marines.

 

Combat Doctrines:

 

"Everything is a weakness when faced with the right kind of strength." - Captain Agrant, 4th Company of the Sons of Calderon

 

The Sons of Calderon pride themselves on their analytical approach to battle. Ever-quick to identify weakness in the enemy's lines or strategy, the Sons of Calderon have been the masterminds behind many victories which should have been out of the Imperium's grasp. Their use of rare technology is never more evident than when the Sons of Calderon bring their ancient, honoured weapons to bear on the fields of battle, and often the careful use of these relics is a keystone from which victory can be constructed.

 

One other battlefield tradition, inherited from their genetic ancestors, is the rank of Emperor's Champion. One chosen marine per company is issued with a suit of the finest, toughest armour the Chapter has to offer, armed with a devastating Power Falx from the Sons' extensive armoury, and tasked with hunting down and destroying the strongest warriors the enemy side has to offer. Very few enemies can stand strong in the face of such Champions, whose blades are more than capable of cutting a foe in half with a single, powerful stroke.

 

Captains of the Sons of Calderon are wise in the ways of their brothers - their tireless exploits alongside the Reclamation Fleets have seen them fight alongside brother Space Marines on all manner of battlefields. As such, the Sons of Calderon are adept at laying plans that play heavily to the strengths of their allies and avoid internal conflict as much as possible.

[Conn Eremon]

Subsector Liber Regnum
The area where the Imperium of Man first planted the Aquila within the Liber Cluster and once the most heavily populated Sector in the Cluster. It remains the Cluster’s seat of power for the Imperials, centered upon Libera Mundi.

Libera Mundi – The seat of the Administratum Master, essentially the ruler of the Liber Cluster. One of its moons has been converted by Mechanicum detachments to become a port, repair station and shipyard.

The Senatorum Liberum - A senate loosely based on the example of the High Lords of Terra, wherein representatives of the Liber Cluster's most important factions meet and offer counsel. Ruled by the Administratum Master.

Terminus Crux – An ancient, abandoned space station now owned by the Ecclesiarchy. The Seat of the Liber Cardinal, Terminus Crux is a site of frequent pilgrimage for the faithful.

Saneslau System – Home to the Saneslau Mechanicum, the foremost representatives of the Adeptus Mechanicus in the Liber Cluster. The system contains three Forge Worlds, an Agri-world and a collection of shipyards.

Nabaretti – Large Hive World orbiting a star on the furthest edge of the Liber Cluster, with a population of 50 billion. This Hive World has produced over 800 active regiments.

Velmghart - Sister world to Nabaretti, whose population mostly live in a single gargantuan Hive Spire. Rumours of a Tzeentchian Cult on the world persist.

Carver’s World – Quite Arguably the Merchant Capital of the Liber Cluster, Carver's World is indisputably a key link in over 90% of trade between the Liber Cluster and the wider Imperium.

Pellucid – Home World of the Lords Inviolate Chapter. Composed of immense, bowl-shaped continents and endangered megafauna.

Maccar – Asteroid covered in many shrines dedicated to Mankind, believed to be one of the earliest holdings of the Imperium within the Liber Cluster. Granted to the Void Jumpers as a retirement world.

Gardenhome – Classified as a pleasure world, Gardenhome is deliberately kept pristine by a host of Magos Biologis. The Liber Cluster's ruling classes keep immense, ornate mansions on this world.

Anesidora – Home World of the Iron Ravagers Chapter and the Anesidorian Mechanicus

Arrax – Noted for the fall of the Angels Exultant Chapter from the Emperor’s grace

Scythia – Home World of the Black Falcons Chapter

Vorden – A former Adeptus Arbites training world that came to rule over its neighbors, cybernetic implants are very common in its inhabitants.

Hatake - An ice world controlled by ganger-aristocrats and their shadowy warrior-clans, the Rusk. Many Imperial Guard regiments are raised from Hatake, specifically the Rusk.

 

Grythia – An icy world of inconcievably dense, hardy jungle life, whose primary export is meat from the great wooly Bracoths, hunted by nomadic hunter-gatherer clans.

 

Primarchia – A glorious agri-world that is home to not only several thriving food industries, but a surprisingly successful tourism industry.

 

Kachani – Former mining world extracting minerals and salts from the ion-rich sea water, reclassified cardinal world after holy rebellion saw public and spiritual rule combine.

 

Balachoi Asteroid Field – Two large rocky planets collided within the Balachoi System, creating a dense asteroid field. The piloting skills of the miners are often put to great use in the Navy.

 

Goshen – A bleak Imperial manufactoring world whose products range from lumen globes to rebreathers and even lasguns. So-called ‘mob’ regiments raised from Goshen show a stark contrast between their rank and file, and show an honorable willingness to die in the Emperor’s name.

Edited March 15, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

Subsector Centralis

                Comprising the very core of the Liber Cluster, this Subsector’s volatile, tightly packed collection of stars makes it the least populated Subsector within the Cluster, in spite of it having the highest concentration of stars. Nevertheless, the incredible wealth of rare minerals, spatial and sometimes temporal phenomena, and the near constant bending and sometimes breaking of commonly held laws of reality means that in spite of its dangers this Subsector does see its fair share of traffic.

 

The Tempest – Warpstorm of immense proportions on the very outskirts of the Cluster’s thickly packed core, swallowing even the would-be Shrineworld of Mabinos, gravesite of the venerated Warmaster, Wilym Mabinos, Hero of the Reclamation and would-be Patron Saint of the Liber Cluster. Many attempts have been made by the Imperium to contain the evil within, but to no avail. A splinter force of Mankind’s most hated, terrible foe dwells deep within, eying the Cluster with baleful hunger and wicked glee.

 

The Soul Reaper System – Collection of planetary systems on the outskirts of the Tempest and one of the last to be reclaimed by the Imperium, with many colonize-able worlds. The system contains many large fields of debris between its worlds and stars, sole evidence of ancient orbital battles fought before the Silence, and more recently when the Reclamation Fleets encountered strong Eldar resistance to the Imperium’s return.

 

Reclaimers’ End - Designated CB1-9, Soul Reaper System. Maiden world
 

Besaine - Designated CB3-10, Soul Reaper System. Maiden world.
 

Ships’ Fall - Designated CB2-8, Soul Reaper System. Quarantined by order of the Inquisition
 

Aquila Rise - Designated CB1-1, Soul Reaper System. Ecclesiarchal world.

 

Aquila’s Reach – Designated CB1-7, Soul Reaper System. Hive World
 

Sandbox - Designated CB-4, Soul Reaper System. Mining World. Raw materials are sent to CB1-3 for use.
 

[Unnamed] - Designated CB1-3, Soul Reaper System. Shipyards and dry docks orbit the planet.
 

[Unnamed] - Designated CB2-5, Soul Reaper System. Agri world.
 

[Unnamed] - Designated CB3-6, Soul Reaper System. Agri world.
 

[Unnamed] - Designated CB2-2, Soul Reaper System. Dead World. Unconfirmed Watch Fortress.

 

Sefaris – This wind-blown planet suffers from wildly shifting atmospheric pressures due to the world’s erratic orbit about its twin suns. However, the industrious Sefarians utilize the torrentious winds to great effect, powering their manufactorums by funneling and concentrating wind currents into the labyrinthine tunnel networks that thread through the factories. It is said by many those within the Mechanicus that it is false to assume that their logical minds have no room for the appreciation of art. There is nothing more beautiful than the song of the winds, endlessly sung in the forges of Sefaris.

 

Krineland – Once believed to be the closest inhabitable world to the Liber Cluster’s centermost point, the relatively unremarkable civilized world took this fact to heart, as a matter of great, and indeed biannual, celebration. The Kriner provide little of value to the greater Imperium, instead being merely acceptably self-sufficient. Not exempt from the tithes, however, this leaves their only true export being manpower to the Emperor’s armies, in the form of mechanized, shock assault regiments. Ever since the colonization of the void colony Es’viener, technically 23 light-years closer to the commonly accepted central point, Krineland has become increasingly belligerent and hostile in the Centralis Court. Accusations fly with increasing toxicity, and often of questionable accuracy, about the many crimes of the void colony against the peoples of Krineland. Many times Subsector Command has been forced to enforce a ceasefire between the two, though exasperation and intolerance over the situation leaves Krineland’s perceived primacy in the Subsector highly suspect.

 

Libitum – Home World of the Heralds of Letum Chapter

 

Aquimarne – A high native mutation rate curses this otherwise paradisiacal shrine world. Though Aquimarne still sees a heavy stream of pilgrims, there are astonishingly few settlers.

 

Kakasis – Agri-world subsumed by the Tempest, now put to infernal use supporting the vast cult hordes that are all that remained behind of the Imperial population, among others who have made a home within the Tempest.

Edited March 15, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

Subsector Colvin

                One of the galactically southern quadrants, the Colvin Subsector is known for its extensive ship graveyards and unusual mineral deposits

 

Rictus IV – Acted as provisional capital for the Subsector during the reclamation process. Its status was eventually supplanted by the return of Colvin Majoris, former capital of the region. However, during the war against the Colvin secessionists, Rictus IV was one of the few worlds to remain under Imperial control. As such, it was the Imperial HQ for the war efforts, and following its conclusion was able to reclaim its former status as the Subsector capital, now on a permanent basis.

 

Colvin Majoris – Capital of the Colvin Subsector, former home world of one of the Liber Cluster’s most prominent of Imperial dynasties, the Olgevins. Ice world famed for its defenses and as the resting world of one of the Liber Cluster’s greatest saints, Colvin Majoris had its original call to fame during the conquest of the Ghostlands region, where its position is a forward base saw rapid growth and development. When Saint Verdinant returned, the entire Subsector seceded from the Imperium. After centuries of warfare, Imperial forces claimed the Colvin system. However, increasing solar activity forced them to abandon the system. The worlds within are now scoured clean of all life.

 

Colvin Minoris – Former frontier world that acts as a staging area for the Ghostlands conquest.

 

Durant - Once a naval port of call, Durant is now little more than a waystation frequented by mercenaries and scum alike. The mutants that live on the moon of Durant, Charis, are regularly culled or hunted by slavers. They are afforded no rights as citizens of the Liber Cluster. Durant itself is a warren of tunnels and supply caverns, the spaceport serving as more of a settlement these days than an actual military facility. The planet may be small but should you need a hired gun, there is plenty to find here. Following the Colvin secession, this world is placed under very harsh control by the Adeptus Arbites to ensure that a repeat does not occur. Though few mercenary companies will now frequent this world, it remains the place to be to hire them. As the mercenaries themselves left, middlemen and agents remained behind as intermediaries between the mercenaries and potential customers.

                                          

Drysthelm - Although nominally settled and even supplying a minimal tithe, Dysthelm is a death world that barely manages to support itself. Unusual to many death worlds, Drysthelm is both interminably hot in the equatorial regions and lethally cold at the poles. Where one would expect temperate regions lie only storm wracked seas, smashing asunder all who are foolish enough to travel them by boat. With few Imperial outposts in the polar regions, the majority of the population resides at the equator - a place of volcanoes, earthquakes, scorching UV rays and very little moisture. Life is short for the itinerant peoples here.

 

Muldacia - Tropical world whose human inhabitants live on the coastal regions, with an enormous slave population of "saurial" abhumans. The decaying corpse of a void kraken poisoned its southwestern continent.

 

Cardinalis – Home World of the Conflagrators

 

Planet R390 – Home World of the All-Seers Chapter

 

Ghostlands – Region of space that commonly sees Warp effluence, vessels displaced not just by distance but in time as well. Three void kraken have been witnessed hunting in the region. At least one was corrupted by the fell touch of the Warp during Colvin’s secession. The vile abomination tore through many Imperial ships before being caught by Muldacia’s gravity well.

 

Burgess - Little more than a frontier world for millennia, Burgess is poor in the way of mineral riches and commodities useful to the Imperium. The dusty grey soil barely supports crops and the locals usually subsist on fungal growths gathered from the caverns found throughout Burgess. Any water to be found on Burgess also comes from underground, aquifers and wells delving deep to gather fresh supplies. The only place of interest on the entire planet is a ruined city from from the golden age of technology, still locked with techno-arcane seals and identity-challenges.

 

Gharam Lesk - Named after the infamously egotistical Rogue Trader, the world of Gharam Lesk has grown into a hive world after millennia of development and population growth. Initially classed as a civilised planet, the various warp-routes that lead towards the Centralis sub-sector brought enough trade and riches for Gharam Lesk to grow into a manufacturing giant. Many of the Chimeras and Las-weapons used in the Colvin sub-sector and it's neighbours are stamped with the stylised GL hallmark and the ancient crest of the Rogue Trader.

 

Kriiiz - An unusual world located on the rimward border of the Colvin and Arrenthal Sub-sectors, Kriiiz is a mineral-rich death world orbitting the larger Gas Giant Junaal, much of the surface is covered in vast crystal growth as well as being heavily irradiated by it's energetic blue star. Vast electrical storms are a common occurance on Kriiiz, often sweeping across continents before dissapating over the oceans Kriiiz is home to all manner of hostile flora and fauna, including a hostile Xenos race known as the Zaazhin. Highly advanced, viciously intelligent and possessing multi-limbed, crystalline bodies that can shrug off bolter rounds with ease, the Zaazhin are extremely territorial and ferociously attack any who dare enter their home system, though almost never stray from their borders themselves. Although usually the Zaazhin's insular nature meant they could have easily been ignored by the Imperium without worry, the reports of vast mineral weath and rare elements present on Kriiiz by the Explorator Fleet that first discovered it means that future conflict with the Xenos is highly likely.

 

Charybdis – Like the Clans of Medusa Orbital Phenomena, the Charybdis is an unusual Space Hulk. Orbiting the binary star system Typhon-Echidna, the Charybdis is an immense, spherical conglomeration that bottoms out as planetary in size. What makes this Space Hulk unique is not its abnormal size, however, but of its stable anchorage within the material realm. Discovered late in the 41^st Millennium, it has already been explored by many enterprising magos of the Mechanicus. However, this construct-world is not without its dangers and these explorations have only begun to scratch the “mantle.”

 

Tristan Humphrey Albrecht Rockderry-Montel VII’s World – The capital of this agri-world includes an impressive shrine-mausoleum dedicated to the Emperor, and of course the wealthy family that owns the deeds to the world.

 

Pallias – Low-tech agri world whose people practice a pacifistic offshoot of the Imperial Creed. The few Imperial Guard regiments raised from this world are famed sharpshooters.

 

Charatys – Gas giant with an outer atmospheric layer similar in composition to Terra. Classified as an agri-world on the basis of its plankton-clouds and other unique organisms.

 

Navitorci – An unusual forge world of steam and clockwork machinery within the Ghostlands, that has resisted absorption by either the Martian Orthodoxy or the Saneslau Technocracy.

[Conn Eremon]

Subsector Englica
The Englican section of the Liber Cluster suffers the worst from the predations of xenos, and has a strong Inquisitorial presence.

Mundus Novus – Large system housing the headquarters of the Ordo Xenos within the Subsector.

Acripa – Distant world within the Mundus Novus system, where a prominent Watch-Fortress of the Ordo Xenos chamber-militant, the Deathwatch, has been emplaced.

Garandor – Xenos-infested system that has regularly pushed back all attempts at purgation. It is home to a number of deadly, fast-evolving xenos breeds. Each attack against the Xenos here reveals new threats.

Libertas – Home World of the Eagles of Glory Chapter, colonized by a wildly diverse array of Imperial Citizens.

Anglin – Scarlet Sentinel Chapter recruitment world; Albion System. A world of islands, dominated by naval warfare.

Caledon – Scarlet Sentinel Chapter recruitment world; Albion System. A world defined by it's stubborn clansmen and their taste for warfare.

Cambris – Scarlet Sentinel Chapter recruitment world; Albion System. A mountainous world of both great beauty and great peril.

Kalliel – Den World of the Darghoul xenos breed.

Warpstorm Id’ilmar – a Warpstorm that may have been caused by a Thinking Machine, the story of which serves as a grim warning to distrust all non-Mechanicus technology.

Evalissia - A feudal world on the edge of the Englica sub-sector. Evalissian Regiments are hardened by constant warfare and supplemented by all manner of mercenaries.

Calahan - A thriving Agri-World ruled brutally by the Tarantus and Randahl clans. It's capital, Skyreach, is the destination for the world's great land-trains that transport the harvests.

Trazis - An Ork-held world that orbits the binary stars of the Atris system, TRazis alternates between being a frozen, barren wasteland and a scorched, radioactive hellhole.

Reyingras - A rocky, mineral-rich world that will likely soon be destroyed by Krantz, a rogue planetoid nearing the end of its decaying orbit around Reyingras. Upon it's destruction, the Imperium will likely begin mining the debris.

Schola Scionis – World upon which the Schola Progenium maintains a presence. Known as a training world for the Tempestus Scions, such as the Veimarr Eagles.

Liniam – Feudal world plagued roving bands of Orks. Left with primitive technology since the Silence, it's denizens shun Imperial advances in technology for reasons known only to themselves.

Geius Prime – A Forge World that was once consumed by the Silence. Though rejuvenated by the Saneslau Mechanicus, it has an uneasy relationship with it's sister world of Liniam.

Chevalius – Knight world in the Mundus Novus system, vassal to the Forge World Geius Prime. Unlike most knight worlds, the houses of Chevalius are newly formed following reclamation.

Grennarch - Home World of the Aetheric Swords Chapter. A feudal world of forests and rivers, much of the Chapter's character comes from the clansmen of Grennarch.

Gyrron – System on the outskirts of the Cluster. Over-run with Khornate cultists that originated on Hive Eshilgahaï, of Gyrron Secundus

Magadha – Agrarian world devastated by an Ork invasion. The Imperial Governor’s actions during the war prompted some to advocate for his canonization, but so far to no avail. The planet was reclassified as a mining world when purgation of the Orks rendered Magadha’s farmlands worthless.

 

The Vill – An immense space station larger than most moons and of unknown design or origin, the Vill’s discovery is enshrined as a moment of rapture. The dome and arm-surfaces are dotted with massive church structures, noble estates and the headquarters of powerful trade consortiums.

 

Cryptoclast – An inhospitable forge world of searing electrical storms, Cryptoclast is the chosen seat of the Fabricator-Luminare, highest-ranking representative of the Martian Orthodoxy.

[Conn Eremon]

Subsector Arrenthal
Alongside Subsectors Colvin, Englica and Liber Regnum, Subsector Arrenthal consists of Terra-facing stars, as the Cluster side facing the Imperium is colloquially known.

Ensek - Though the cities of Ensek are smoggy and bleak, the landscape outside city limits is mostly rolling, mossy steppes, populated by crab-like xeno creatures.

Huntordon Alpha - Though it appears peaceful, this world is dominated by gang warfare, as each struggles to produce more of the drug 'Thrash' than their competitors.

Finis - A dead world quarantined by the Inquisition, it's single city is filled with black, humanoid statues, frozen in poses of horror and despair, their terrifyied eyes turned towards the black sky.

Raptus - An Agri-world consisting mostly of storm-wracked seas, best known for it's global fishing industry. The population mostly either become fishermen or Imperial Guardsmen.

Caeburgh – Technically the moon orbiting the dead world of Jovact, Caeburgh is home to the famous Hauer's Watch - a highly regarded military academy.

Kiyaga – Kiyaga is famous for both it's rare minerals and highly corrosive fogs. The only place safe from the toxic coulds is in the high mountains, where mining operations take place.

Alam - Target of the xenos reavers known as Dark Eldar.

Clans of Medusa Orbital Phenomena – Centennial appearance known to disrupt astropathic communications and endanger nearby ship movement. A Space Hulk made from what is clearly Iron Hands Legion spacecraft, although little else is known about it.

Mertyl – Paradise world, under assault by an Ork Waagh!

Coral’s Veil – Oceanic agri-world, under assault by an Ork Waagh!

Artanias – Gang-run Hive-world known to skirt the edges of secession, under assault by an Ork Waagh!

Tenopia Majoris – Forge world, an Imperial marvel in the art of defensive system networks. Under assault by an Ork Waagh!

Ashen Abyss – Death world known equally well for its deadly creatures and highly volatile landscape. Said to be dangerous even for Space Marines to land on.

 

Golcadi – The vegetation of this agri-world has a leathery skin that can be woven into footwear and even leather buckets

 

Namoda Delta - A cold world of enormous penal-cities, the indigenous population as wardens until an Inquisitor ordered their execution and repopulation upon discovery of a heretical cult in their midst.

 

The Soladrid Chain - Seven agri-worlds in orbit over the dead world in which Soladrid life originated. Noted for its draconic predators and talented hunter caste, the latter of which has provided many capable regiments. Soon to be on a war footing with Caeburgh.

[Conn Eremon]

Antipatris Subsector

The Void-facing subsector furthest from Terra, reclamation faced heavy opposition from the Sereiki Lions in what was to be called the Eighteen Worlds Crusade.

 

Thravis Prime - Capital city is called Lanholm. Under the thrall of the Sereiki Lions until a Black Falcons force liberated the world. 

 

Durtuvar - The world upon which Major Vincen Acuda betrayed the Imperium and sided with the Sereiki Lions.

 

Sranav – Forge World formerly pledged to the Sereiki Lions

 

Lelith Secundus – Factory World formerly pledged to the Sereiki Lions

 

Baluarte - A heavily fortified merchant planet. Also heavily defended by Lion fleets. Has at least two moons. Capital is called Dorado.

 

Heroda IV - Agri world formerly terrorised by the Lions.

 

Cenicika - Agri world formerly terrorised by the Lions.

 

Tonagish - Feudal/Knight world, burned by the Lions and its population enslaved. Home to the MkCormick Knight House.

 

Evin Prime - Hive World and main power base for Lion forces. Capital hive is called Sitianu.

 

Zavatista - A world covered in chem-oceans. Refinery-ships sail the seas, gathering and processing the chemical oceans into fuel for Lion forces.

 

Venet- A Lions-held regimental world, fought over by the Aetheric Swords and Heralds of Letum

 

Barek Zayim – Former mining world turned into a forward supply base for the assault on the Eighteen Worlds. Abandoned following the destruction of the Munitorum supply complex by the Sereiki Lions.

 

Nimobia – Lion’s held world ravaged by the Imperium, turned into a barren husk barely suitable for settlement.

 

Helfen – A marsh-covered rich in promethium pockets, though this resource was not exploited by the Sereiki Lions.

 

Caecus – Death world that has seen limited colonization efforts. The disappearance of many explorers has developed into a legend, with fantastical theories ranging anywhere from airborne toxins within the fog to a secret refuge of the Sereiki Lions.

 

Andalus – Grassland-world known for its orbiting Mechanicum manufactorum-satellites and regiments. Proved a vital link in the supply lines during the Eighteen Worlds Crusade, even suffering an attack from the Sereiki Lions.

 

Shenac – Home to the Bladecatchers Regiments. Major Vincen Acuda and his traitorous regiment hailed from Shenac

 

Glavor – Former agri-world whose primary crop was a thick, spongy edible fungus that covers nearly the entire surface of the planet, sturdy enough to support the weight of a full-grown man. A key battle during the Eighteen Worlds Crusade was fought over its produce, during which the Sereiki Lions set flame to the planet’s fungal surface in defiance of Imperial victory.

 

Korvalion Epsilon – Imperial world fought over during the Eighteen Worlds Crusade

 

The Lion’s Den – Asteroid belt that was the primary seat of power for the Sereiki Lions, site of the final battle for the Eighteen Worlds Crusade. Now a quarantined zone, protectorate of the Lords Inviolate.

 

Naxa Secundus – An Imperial world whose population quickly outgrew its singular hive-city and has spread a thin urban layer across the globe. The hard city life under the rule of crime bosses saw many willing volunteers for the Sereiki Lions. Its orbiting moon, Ogris, was converted into a large-scale satellite factory.

 

Gauntfell – Rocky prison world utterly enveloped in a thick fog. Said to maintain a cell block to imprison captured Heretic Astartes, and is even rumored to hold a member of the Sereiki Lions.

 

Molmaga – A jungle world that was converted heavily by Imperial settlers, Molmaga is now best known for housing one of the Liber Cluster's largest prisons.

 

St. Crispin’s World – A once-abandoned Agri world that now serves as an outpost for Inquisitors of every Ordo. One of the furthest worlds from Holy Terra and the Imperium.

Edited March 15, 2018 by Conn Eremon

[Conn Eremon]

Subsector Sindhi

Smallest of the Liber Cluster subsectors, largely mercantile in nature. A research-rich substratum of systems were claimed by a Rogue Trader dynasty by right of conquest decades before the forces of reclamation arrived, leading to an unusual circumstance of a subsector hereditary lordship tied to the dynasty.

[Conn Eremon]

Other Locales

The following locations are of currently unknown position or exist outside Imperial Subsector units.

 

The Deep – Region of space directly outside the Cluster. Though there are by definition no stars in the Deep, it does have its fair share of rogue worlds, often having been ejected from the Cluster by commonly severe gravitational stresses. It is theorized by the Adeptus Mechanicus that there may be more rogue worlds in the Deep then there are planets in the Cluster, however their very nature makes them exceptionally difficult to find. In spite of the many thousands of worlds there may be floating out there, lost in the black, only a bare handful has ever seen an Imperial presence for any mentionable amount of time. Though most that might see this statistic would balk at the opportunity to explore the Deep, there has never been a dearth of willing explorers, rogues or heretics who would make the plunge, though few if any ever return. How the hated Lions ever managed to not only survive but also flourish out there in the dark for all those thousands of years is a question many in the Liber would like to know.

 

Grissum Primus – An Imperial world that fell to Chaos during the Silence and recaptured by Imperial forces in 102.M36. Notable as the world where Saint Raphen first revealed himself.

Jussian Omega – An ork world conquered by the Imperium in 134.M36. The site of Saint Raphen's death in the Callidan Mountains is now a monastery dedicated to Imperial military tactics and history. In three subsectors of the Liber Cluster it is compulsory to complete a six-month study at the monastery before attaining the rank of Lord General. 

 

Talbarde – Long considered one of the key pillars of the Ecclesiarchy's might within the Liber Cluster, the Cardinal World of Talbarde is one part centre of religious worship, one part impenetrable fortress. Cathedrals of unimaginable grandeur and resplendence are built around ancient planetary defence batteries, each housing weaponry designed to shoot down potential hostile ships in orbit and decorated in the same ornate, baroque style as the churches. Despite the fact Talbarde is undoubtedly the dominion of the Ecclesiarchy, there can also be found several temples to the Omnissiah, the better to appease the Saneslau Mechanicus forces responsible for the maintenance of Talbarde's defences. Talbarde is also home to the Order of Vengeful Flame, a small force of Adeptas Sororitas who act primarily as a bastion force for nearby systems.

 

Akina VI – The only habitable world in the Akina system, Akina VI is a popular pilgrimage destination for faithful all across the Cluster. Almost as much a Hive World as a Shrine World, housing on this world tends to be confined to single rooms, crammed in, around and even under the street-spanning temple complexes and ornate chapels that make up most of the world's major cities. Although the local Arbites and city watchmen are kept busy with near-continuous theft problems and occasional public brawls over matters of faith, and the living conditions on a planet-wide basis would, on any other world, be deemed pretty close to unacceptable, every day more pilgrims feel moved to settle on what is considered a blessed world by the Ecclesiarchy.

 

Canis – Small planet located near the fringe of the Cluster, site of an Ordo Xenos Watch Station. Additionally classified as an agri-world, its foodstuff production specific to long-range fleet travel needs.

Moribus – Former home world of the Raven Brotherhood Chapter, lost to the Silence.

 

Hammerlin – One of few colonies out in the Deep, since overtaken by the renegade Untaken force as their base of operations.

 

Grundwald – Chief armoury world capable of arming millions of soldiers at a time. Suspected black market trading currently under Inquisitorial attention.

 

Sterunas – A cemetery world overfilled with the dead, leaving no room for the native population to develop its own produce. Cannibalism frequently breaks out, the only resource Sterunites can trade offworld with is themselves, leading to rather macabre regiments.

 

Tarno – Hive World of great cities built in underground caverns beneath vast irradiated deserts.

 

Rosiya – An old backwater hive world cleansed of life after falling to the chaotic forces of the Anguishors.

 

Rhyn-Majoris – Cathedral world declared holy for its prominence within the Liber Cluster prior to the Silence, but by the close of the of the 41^st Millennium had degenerated into a heretical cult that sought the Cluster’s independence from the Imperium.

[Conn Eremon]

Notable Denizens

House Barandion – The noble and ancient house of Barandion is among those few Rogue Trader Houses to predate the Imperium itself, its vaunted writ of trade penned by the Emperor Himself in the latter days of the Unification of Terra, though such knowledge is gone even from the Barandion House itself. The Rogue Trader House came to the Liber Cluster for its untapped potential, as ambitious, young heirs sought to return to the kind of glory denied to them since the hated Great Betrayer revolted against the Emperor and all of Mankind. While House Barandion has provided untold wealth of resources to the Administratum since coming to the Liber Cluster, it has refused return payments. This has raised suspicions with the Emperor’s Inquisition, who feel that the House Barandion must hold secret worlds and treasures.

 

Ordo Hereticus/Liber Branch – The closest thing the Liber branch of the Ordo Hereticus has to an acknowledged leader is Isaac Markova al-Salvador, though few are aware that there is a joint command, alongside his wife Terys ap Diarmuid de Markova. Though externally an odd pairing, there is far more to them beneath the surface, their talents and agendas fitting together near seamlessly.

 

The Aleph-Null Directorate – Headed by Inquisitor Lord Ermin Randahl-Tarantus, this cell focuses solely upon investigating the Saneslau Mechanicus and its vassalages, forges and holdings. Brought together after the Saneslau Fabricator-Locum was executed for heresy mid-M41, by Randahl-Tarantus himself, the Directorate continues to uncover possible agents and initiatives linked to the ill-fated Fabricator-Locum. However, outside pressure has begun to take its toll on the Directorate, as the Mechanicus has begun petitioning Cluster Command to deal with what could only be prejudice against the Saneslau Cult. From within, the ambitious and violent Inquisitor Brosdau often challenges the Inquisitor Lord’s authority.

 

The Cydonists – While not wholly unique to the Liber Cluster, nor politically powerful within Inquisitorial circles, the Cydonists are enthralled and in many cases beholden to the Adeptus Mechanicus, displaying a surprising variety of means and methods, often mechanical in nature. To be a Cydonist is to embrace the duality of the Emperor and the Machine-God as one, to even allow that the Mechanicus Cult is correct in its view of the Emperor as the Omnissiah. While the Cydonists have strong allies in the Mechanicus, they receive nothing but hostility from the Ecclesiarchy and its allied powers. As such, the Cydonists maintain appearances when outside of Mechanicus domains, going so far as to even maintain the human shape and appearance no matter how augmented, even with the use of skin grafts and high quality vat-grown musculature.

 

Fiend of Caerbannog – Found upon Drysthelm, in the sulphurous wastes known as Caerbannog, this monster boasts an impressive set of teeth and razor sharp talons. Accompanying a ferocious territorial mindset are powerful hind legs and lightning quick reactions, all of which ensure the Fiend an ability to pounce upon it's victims without warning or mercy. Many have been deceived by its small stature and have paid the ultimate price, their bones and trappings littering the ground around the Fiend's lair. Such is the rarity of the Fiend and its ilk, many believe that only one specimen exists. This assumption is likely due in part to the unwillingness to attempt any study of the one known Fiend and a distinct naivety on the part of those that have braved the wilderness to reach the lair in Caerbannog.

 

The Veimarr Eagles – The Veimarr Eagles are soaring testaments to the highly trained capabilities of the Tempestus Scions. Their unorthodox training regimens provides an inconstant, slow flow of recruits, but few who have borne witness to after-battle debriefs and statistics doubt the integrity and efficacy of these elite soldiers

 

The Saneslau Mechanicus – A melting pot of commerce, organized crime and the tenets of the Tech-Priests, the Forge Worlds of the Saneslau System survived the Silence where many of its less flexible sister planets were torn apart. Lacking the backing of Mars and the needed framework to gather raw materials normally, Saneslau’s salvation came from an Arch-Magos hailing from the infamous Merkova crime syndicate. These underworld aristocrats sought to gain influence in the Saneslau System by sending their young to be fostered by the Mechanicus Cult, little realizing how little ‘humanity’ these children retained upon ascension to the higher callings. This didn’t stop the knowledge of extortion, blackmail, of using wealth and guile as a shield against brute force and all the shifty wisdom that a Merkova imbibes alongside mother’s milk from being passed along and adopted by the Saneslau ruling caste. These were lessons the Saneslau Mechanicus took to rather well, and with such skills attained ascendancy over all other Mechanicus factions within the Liber Cluster, eclipsing even the impossibly distant Mars.

 

The Saneslau Umbrii – The Umbrii are a secretive group, frequently augmented with all manner of silenced weaponry, such as mechandendrites specialized for garroting and injecting poison, and are known to graft chameleoline and other forms of optic and electronic camouflage directly to their bodies. They refer to their code of conduct as Downing’s Principles of Lethality. Who Downing was is a mystery to all but those within this secretive band.

 

Saneslau Myrmidons – The Lord of the Saneslau myrmidons is a peerless warrior and a great leader, if hotheaded and impetuous. As such, the adaptability and machine-like precision of Cherrushky Gerjeshish, Magos Secutor and second in command of the myrmidons, is noteworthy, as often his fluid and organic battle plans are the cause behind success when his lord’s temper escapes him.

 

Legio Phlegethon – Legio Phlegethon, cognomen ‘The Ferrymen,’ patented by the Saneslau Mechanicus, is a large Titan Legion noted for its inordinate amount of smaller Titan chassis chasses that make it up, primarily Warhounds. The Saneslau Tribunes utilize this Legion to great effect, the Princeps adept at incinerating enemies in shock assaults and nurturing firestorms that swallow all but the most inflammable terrain. It is suspected the within the elite echelon of the Legion, the nigh mythical phosphex rounds are used to devastate the enemy.

 

Velmgharter Soldiers – The Velmgharter Soldier regiments that utilize “shackled psyker” technologies are tithed from the local PDF, highly trained urban warriors maintained and commanded by the corporate rulers of Velmghart. After the self-destructive implosion of multiple regiments, successive regiemnts founded upon this world originate from a single megacorporation’s private army at a time. This has often been to horrendous effect, as the megacorporations so selected are often targeted by their rivals in these moments of military weakness, at times even resulting in hostile takeovers.

 

Maccaran Void Jumpers - The Maccaran Void Jumpers , former naval armsmen battalions trained by the Adeptus Arbites to aid in crowd control in the earliest settlements, this well-regarded regiment enjoys the patronage of the Saneslau Mechanicus. Over the millennia, the Void Jumpers have grown to incredible sizes, and their contingents can be seen in virtually every major battlefield across the Cluster. Due to their exceptional successes, regiments of the Void Jumpers are sometimes allowed to retire upon the heavily enshrined asteroid called Maccar.

 

The Liniamite Volunteers - The Liniamite Volunteers are tithed from Liniam, a world still plagued by roving bands of feral orks. Though mostly composed of poorly trained conscripts, each regiment includes a company’s worth of volunteers from the Liniam PDF forces, collectively nicknamed the Ork Hunters. Though they can be quite skilled in war against the greenskin xenos, the Liniamite regiments are not the most valued regiments, and are usually assigned garrison or second-line duties when not utilized for the numerous meat-grinder missions.

 

The Sranav Partisans – Imperial Guard regiment hailing from a Forge World formerly held by the Sereiki Lions. Suffered a period of penance for its subjugation to the mercenary lords. The regiment combines past experience in guerilla warfare with a high apportionment of armored vehicles and constructs.

 

House Salvador – One of the pre-eminent Rogue Trader dynasties of the Cluster, having survived the long isolation of the Silence relatively intact, embracing reunification with fanatical zeal. Though often dismissed as subversive rumors, there are those who believe this House to have been, for all intents and purposes, purchased by the Saneslau Mechanicum.

 

The Evalissian Caesars – Imperial Guard regiments raised from Evalissia that still retain strong clan-loyalties from their time in the world’s rather mercenary PDF.

 

Order of Vengeful Flame – Order of the Adepta Sororitas based out of Talbarde, primarily used as a bastion force for nearby systems.

 

Battlegroups Truth, Mercy and Regret – Three naval fleets that patrol the space stretching from Albion to Grennarch, the persistent warpstorm Id’ilmar along the route.

 

Knight House Ongira, ‘Layers of Shrouds’ – Chevalius’s first Knight House, known for its rather amoral tactics on the battlefield.

 

Knight House Daranthior, ‘Pilgrim Guards’ – Chevalius’s second Knight house, its scions intended to be tempered, positive souls to balance the harsher Ongira.

 

The White Fox – A ship of the Taelborn Dynasty and one of the singularly most powerful Warp-capable craft in the Cluster, it regularly travels across the Deep to maintain trade and communication with the greater Imperium.

 

Ghana-Mali Rogue Trader Dynasty – Two dynasties who had whittled away at each other’s more obstinate and aggressive members, until the then-dominantly amiable family members merged the dynasties into one in a historic marriage ceremony.

 

Rogue Trader House Mokinrai – A once great family now shackled in debt to the Saneslau Mechanicus, with but a haggard and barely functioning collection of ships to their name.

 

Captain Lithone of the Reforged Steel – A woman of considerable acumen who came into possession of a Hereditary Free Charter. In time, she would dominate much of the trade of the Cluster.

 

 

 

 

Notable Foes

An assorted collection of traitorous warbands, heretical recidivists and vile xenos breeds

 

Kabal of the Blissful Reprise – Dark Eldar responsible for a number of attacks against the Imperium within the Cluster’s boundaries, notably the world of Alam.

 

Su’mta Craftworld – One of the great vessels commanded by the hated Eldar, though smaller in size than some of the more well-known vessels within the greater Imperium. Though perhaps a band of lesser stature, the Su’mta Eldar are vicious survivors, and their silver god of war has seen them through their hours of need.

 

Darghoul – Xenos breed native to the Liber Cluster. Technologically capable, they maintained a small empire of twenty worlds upon their discovery by the Imperium. Studies show the species to be innately peaceful, but became increasingly war-like due to continued threat of neighboring Ork empires

 

Orks – The Orks are rampant within the Liber Cluster, as they are everywhere else. When the Imperium first arrived in the Cluster all those millennia ago, it arrived within an immense Ork kingdom that took decades to break through. Though fragmented, the Orks never stopped being one of the greatest threats to Mankind’s survival within the Cluster, from the Ork hordes at the Graz-kelt systems to WAAAGH! Grimlugg Trukksmasha.

 

The Shadow Star – Pirate ship captained by Venyadha the Reviled, a potential renegade Space Marine, witnessed fighting alongside the Sereiki Lions and other forces, leading the Imperium to assume the vessel and its crew are mercenary in nature.

 

The Angels Exultant – Initially one of the newly formed Chapters tasked with the reclamation and safekeeping of the Liber Cluster, the Angels Exultant, led into damnation by Apostles of the Word, gave in to their titanic rages. After multiple atrocities, the Angels Exultant are now widely hunted across the Cluster.

 

The Hammers of Olympia – Formerly of the Iron Warriors Legion, this warband suffered horrific internecine warfare following their betrayal of the Emperor in the unforgotten past. Reformed and remade under the guiding hand of its new Warlord, the Hammers, and its sorcerous contingent called the Gaiakrators, this warband has grown into a formidable threat to the Imperium. Since arriving to the Liber Cluster, they have proven to be a difficult opponent, quite capable of surviving the grinding slogs of attrition over broken terrain.

 

The Sereiki Lions – One of, if not the greatest, foes the Imperium has ever faced within the Liber Cluster. Formerly a mercenary band, the ambition of the Lions saw them turn the tables on employers and taking control. Having amassed armies of greater size than most Imperial Crusades, the Lion’s dens have proved themselves to be veritable havens for the unaligned, the consummate soldiers. Though driven from their mercenary kingdom and into the Deep in the later years of the Reclamation, the Sereiki Lions have only grown in strength since then.

 

The Red Offering ( a.k.a. l’Offrande Rouge) – A highly militarized and well-organized cult of the blood god originating in Gyrron that should have been, by all accounts, uprooted quite readily and easily if not for the incompetence of the Imperial Governor. The Offering has rapidly grown in size and strength, overcoming belated attempts to curb the cult and has begun expanding beyond the Gyrron System.

 

Renegades of the Tempest – Collection of various Chaos Marines of ill repute. Included among their number are Padaricar, Vigo Shastus, ‘Crow,’ and Ba’adike the Spear-Crowned.

 

The Blades of Transmutation – Tzeentch-aligned Black Legion warband led by Ktevaa Sero. A powerful warband that uses its high status in the Black Legion to gather around it an impressive army of Chaos Marines hailing from many different warbands. Though its actions may seem disconnected, it’s possible a greater plan is at work.

 

The Penumbra – Secretive organization within the Liber Cluster and known conspirers against the Imperium. Led by a Lord Grey and those of the “Veiled Heart,” the exact goal of this group is unknown. The Inquisition has launched numerous investigations to learn more information; however, this unknown faction has proven itself most resistant to external surveillance, data-gathering and undercover work.

 

The Forsworn – Vicious, unpredictable Chaos Marine warband known to utilize an internal sub-cult to handle matters the Forsworn themselves are, for whatever reason, unwilling to.

 

The Pale Prowlers – Chaos Marine Raptor Cult that has inspired many bloody legends and folktales of predatory creatures that hunt Man himself as its prey.

 

The Clans of Pandora –Warband comprised of an eclectic collection of Chaos Marines, led by a Chaos Lord known only as “the Eridian.”

 

The Exquisite Exiles – Slaaneshi warband native to the Tempest, where they pursue unpredictable goals based on their lord’s corrupted whims. Readily followed the Black Legion warlord Ktevaa Sero upon his arrival.

 

The Host of the Broken Dawn – Word Bearers warband that debuted in the Liber Cluster in a big way, by throwing the entire Colvin Subsector into a war that lasted centuries. Known to twist the Imperial Creed to their own ends. One of the only Chaos warbands to oppose the Warlord Ktevaa Sero.

 

The Untaken – Renegade warband that first seen allied to the Sereiki Lions, but has since broken away. One of the more vastly sized warbands in the Cluster, with a history potentially originating among the ill-fated first settlements of the Liber Cluster.

 

The Karrneshla – A combined Craftworld/Dark Eldar society, the only one known of its kind. Has made its presence sorely felt through devastating raids upon the Imperium.

 

Shadow Marches – Irregular outbreaks of immense chaos and traitor forces, typically from the Tempest, are often classified as Shadow Marches. Many Shadow Marches have coincided with Black Crusades.

 

The Anguishers – Warband that attacked the planet Rosiya like a pack of rabid dogs, taking the world in an orgy of violence and heresy.