Order of the Serrated Sun

[Uberlord Gendo]

In M37, the remains of a massive cathedral were found on the planet Khur. Archeological study revealed the site to dare back to the time of the Great Crusade, when the Emperor Himself strode the stars. Giving the age and the violent demise, of the site, Imperial scholars concluded that the cathedral had been annihilated during the Heresy. Further study revealed fragments of an incomparably ancient edition of the Lecticio Divinitatus, penned by a previously unknown Saint Aurelian. In order to honor the martyrs of Khur and this Saint Aurelian, an order was formed, their heraldry taken from a now lost splinter of the Ultramarines, the Serrated Suns, whose crimson, black, and iron livery was cruely mocked by the foul Word Bearers. The Order is often called upon to aid in the recovery and protection of relics. Pictured here are some examples of these sisters and their war engines.

[apologist]

Clever conceit for the army scheme – very 40k! – and I really like the accent colours you've chosen. The opulent Word Bearer scheme works beautifully well for the Sisters of Battle.

[Pearson73]

Love the idea behind this, very fitting for the setting.

[Charlo]

Rad idea! 

[Uberlord Gendo]

Thanks all!

 

Here's two more pictures, which really made me see that I need to do a lot of touch-up and detail work:

 

Sister Superior Saitama here is clad in gold, which honors the noble custodes that traveled beside St. Aurelian, clearly sent by The Emperor as a token of respect for St. Aurelian's faith.

 

Sister Superior Aureliana exhorts her squad to greater acts in the Emperor's name.  Honestly, it was this model that gave me the idea.  I saw the pose in a preview image and the open halo reminded me of the old Dark Apostle model.  The mace just added to it.

 

One of the things that I'm going for with them is the idea of manuscript traditions and philology.  I do a lot of that IRL, so the idea with them is that they have this huge library of archaic texts.  I imagine the Ecclesiarchy as a whole having something akin to a doctrine of Apostolic Succession and particularly with Sebastian Thor, I imagine at least these Sisters see the institution and the Canon as guided by the Living Will of the Emperor, or something to that effect, which means that older editions, while potentially accurately reflecting older versions do not impinge on the Canonicity of the current approved text, since the current approved text is a result of His Will.  Since Saints have appeared in all ages, those texts were also valid in their time and place; the Emperor is Eternal, but He modifies His Guidance based on time and place.  Thus, Canon is not eternal, but rather a product of the interaction of His Vision for Humanity and the circumstances that Humanity is now in.  Thus it was that Celestine defied Dogma and Canon to consort with Xenos, but in so doing, carried out the Emperor's Will.  (If she had defied His Will, then she would have no longer been a Saint.)  (Yep, buckle up kiddies, the theology of the Order of the Serrated Sun is going to get weird.)

 

In taking these shots and looking up close, I'm seeing all of my mistakes XD  Any advice on faces?

[Bjorn Firewalker]

In M37, the remains of a massive cathedral were found on the planet Khur. Archeological study revealed the site to dare back to the time of the Great Crusade, when the Emperor Himself strode the stars. Giving the age and the violent demise, of the site, Imperial scholars concluded that the cathedral had been annihilated during the Heresy. Further study revealed fragments of an incomparably ancient edition of the Lecticio Divinitatus, penned by a previously unknown Saint Aurelian. In order to honor the martyrs of Khur and this Saint Aurelian, an order was formed, their heraldry taken from a now lost splinter of the Ultramarines, the Serrated Suns, whose crimson, black, and iron livery was cruely mocked by the foul Word Bearers.

This is ingeniously written. I commend your imagination and your efforts.

Sister Superior Saitama here is clad in gold, which honors the noble custodes that traveled beside St. Aurelian, clearly sent by The Emperor as a token of respect for St. Aurelian's faith.

I presume you're an anime fan. Did Sister Superior Saitama ever destroy a Chaos Titan and/or a Greater Daemon with a Serious Punch?

[Xenith]

Clicked on this thread to correct you, leaving this thread very impressed, nice work!

 

I'm not a fan of the brown tabards on brown-red armour, though, they'd look better in a brighter colour, in my opinion, like you did with baldy Saitama's robes.  

[Montford]

That Imagifier is gorgeous!

[WrathOfTheLion]

Oh my heretic bones are burning. The idea is quite fun though

 

If you want to go further with that, perhaps you could get the Forge World Word Bearers decals. It has the Serrated Sun chapter icon and some Colchisian runes that could spice it up quite a bit.

 

I really enjoy using them all over my 30k WB of course, as well as any CSM sometimes as well.

Edited August 20, 2020 by WrathOfTheLion

[bluntblade]

A ballsy premise. I dig it.

[Nomus Sardauk]

This is delightfully, deliciously ironic and heretical in the best way possible, I look wonder to seeing your Order grow.

[Uberlord Gendo]

Related, I'm thinking of trying to do a battle sanctum. I want to use something like this as the stained glass: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/70/ad/9f/70ad9f22a918b762d9c6610869213890.jpg

 

Any ideas how to get that onto a transparent medium? I don't trust my painting skills.

 

Also, how would you do a miniature version of Papa Emeritus?

 

Of course, I'll also have to do some panels of St. Aurelian of Khur, the Blessed Lady, the Last Angel, and, of course, their Custodes companions.

 

Bjorn, the thing that got me to go with the neon hair colors in the first place was that I decided to give Celestine lilac hair and red eyes because of how she keeps coming back...

Edited August 27, 2020 by Uberlord Gendo

[Aqui]

I've seen people use overhead projector sheets for that kind of thing. You can get them to be used with an inkjet printer. Something I'm considering myself when I get a Battle Sanctum.

 

Might be an idea to use a spray on sealing medium, such as Dullcote, so the printed result doesnt flake off or rub off.

[Scribe]

Bravo OP. Came in with a 'but wait...' left smiling.

[Uberlord Gendo]

Putting up some more pictures.

Here's a Sister Dialogus. I want to come up with a name for her that's a misunderstanding of a name like Erebus or Kor Phaeron, like if they'd seen the name in a badly damaged source and reanalyzed it as a something else, like seeing Utopia and rendering it Eutopia, but I don't speak Ancient Greek to do that with Erebus. Like I think Erebos could be misconstrued as some sort of aorist of a verb rebo or something, but I've got no idea what to do with that. Anyway, here she is:

And here's a detail from an immolator. I think it looks vaguely sinister like this:

[Bjorn Firewalker]

"Eutopia" is a good name for the Sister Dialogus. Her blue hair, and your user name of "Gendo", made me think "Rei" and/or "Ayanami" would be more appropriate.

[Lord_Caerolion]

Things are gonna be awkward if they ever fight alongside Guilliman.

"My lord, you honor us with your presence! Please, what can you tell us about your martyred children, the Serrated Suns? Were they as valiant as we believe?"

"You what?"

[Uberlord Gendo]

Actually, on the subject of Rei Ayanami, consider the Saint Celestine.  I'm doing some touch-up work on her.

 

And Lord Caerolion, yes!  That's fantastic; I'd not even thought about that.  I may have to do a theme list of them alongside the Lord Commander.  Or at least Calgar.  (Love Calgar's model for some reason, whereas I'm never satisfied with 40k G-Man.  I can't count the number of times I've tried reassembling him in a different pose or reworking the colors.)

 

I also had a dreadful idea today involving Russian Orthodox style Icons, but I can't find a flat surface large enough.  My idea is to block out the basic colors and then use a micron pen to do the line-work.  I know I want to do a Custodes, a Papa Emeritus, and a Saint.  Maybe Celestine, though that feels a bit weird since I run her, so probably someone like St. Katherine or St. Dominica.  Oh!  Or the Blessed Lady of Khur!  She put out her eyes rather than watch the destruction of the city, you know... though painting her with her eyes put out... ugh.  Maybe I'll just represent it with tears of blood, which would also allow me to represent her on statues by giving them bloody eyes?  I also want to do icons of The Last Angel, St. Aurelian, and the Ultramarines Chaplain, ...Aborus?  Ebruras?  Ebranos Phareon?  This said, I'm not sure how to visually indicate that St. Aurelian is Lorgar, since all of his symbols are pretty chaotic and the Order thinks he was a mortal.  Similar problems for the two Astartes, though I suppose the armor will say enough and I can stick The Last Angel alongside his sworn brother, the Custodian Aquillon Pious.

 

I'm also thinking I need to convert an Inquisitor specifically to hang out with them from the Ordo Hereticus.  Given their normal duties involving excavation of holy sites and the like, I'm sure there's a lot of Inquisitorial oversight, particularly since they'd need a number of Sisters Dialogus standing by to deal with the recovered texts, not to mention the risk of Chaos taint at a destroyed holy site, but I'm thinking there'd be a line of Inquisitors appointed specifically to keep an eye on this Order.  This said, I'm imagining that any actual veterans of the Long War with the presence of mind to call them out on things would end up very confused, very quickly as the prayer-witches would start burying them in "facts".

"You realize that Lorgar Aurelian wrote the Lecticio Divinitatus, right?"

"What?  That makes no sense.  If he knew the Emperor was a God then why turn?  What kind of a weak-faithed git would do that?"

"But it's true.  The Emperor was mean to him and so he turned."

"The Emperor was mean to him?  Really?  What kind of a weak-ass primarch has daddy issues.  Next you're going to tell me that Horus turned because he was afraid of what would happen to him after the end of the Crusade."

"Actually... yeah, he did.  But he was also stabbed by a chaos-tainted knife."

"And... that made him... crazy?"

"Yeah, he also had like a dream or something that said the Emperor was going to kill him."

"So he turned against the Emperor to avoid having the Emperor trying to kill him?  Brilliant."

"When you say it like that it sounds really dumb, but it all made sense at the time."

"You realize how dumb this all sounds, right?  Like I'm supposed to believe that the high priest of Chaos wrote the Lecticio Divinitatus and then, instead of resolving conflict by investing deeper into faith, went out and found the gods of crazy to worship.  That made sense to him?  This strains credulity."
"Well, then, you're not going to want to hear about Molech."

"Oh, no, please, do tell me what wondrous truths you have to reveal."

"No.  You're just going to make fun of me.  You're really mean.  I'm trying to tell you the truth and you just keep insulting me."

"You're the one claiming that the Emperor punched out Angron rather than helping him with a rebellion on his homeworld when the Emperor intervened to help with affairs of other Primarchs.  You're also claiming that a talking sword turned Fulgrim evil.  And that there's two primarchs of the Alpha Legion.  And that there were a bunch of immortal people running around doing... what, exactly?  This stuff sounds like a poorly written series of novels."

"I'm not talking to you anymore.  Every time we fight, you just insult me and everything I've lived through."

"Oh, the poor heretic.  Did your Primarch daddy not love you enough?  Was the Emperor mean to him?"

"My Primarch was Perturabo.  He never loved any of us.  It really hurt.  Thanks for bringing that back up."

"So what... you followed him into treason to try and win his affection?  How's that working for you?  Chaos is not therapy.  It's like the opposite of therapy."

"Well yeah, that's obvious now, but like at the time, yeah, it kind of made sense and there was a lot of stuff we were working through and really I don't have to justify my life and my choices to my sworn enemies!  I was just trying to be a decent guy and share some of my knowledge from my 10,000 plus years of life with you while I destroyed that holy site of yours, but no, you had to go and make it weird.  Thanks for that.  Now I'm going to be all moody.  And the rest of the men have heard it over vox too.  You know what?  Screw you.  Screw all of you.  If you're not going to take this seriously, we're going home to the warp and you can fight out this whole scenario on your own.  My daemon says that I need to learn to respect myself and my time.  If you're not going to do that, then you're not worth my attention.  I'm going to go watch orphans beat each other up or something."

...

"Heretics... when will they learn?"

[Bjorn Firewalker]

The dialogue between the Sister and the Iron Warrior is well-written. Good job.

[Lord_Caerolion]

Well, you're really going to be upset when you hear about the possible third Alpha Legion Primarch...

[Azekai]

I love this project so much. Knowledge of history should be perverted more often than not in the 41st millennium.

 

Suggestion? To subtly show that St Aurelian is Lorgar, you could have an 8 pointed starburst with the Omega chapter badge of the Ultras superimposed over it.

 

Keep up the awesome work!

[Uberlord Gendo]

St. Ebranos Phareon was an Ultramarines chaplain who was the constant companion of St. Aurelian. It is believed he was eventually martyred at Calth by Erebus.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

The Rhino's rooftop hatch is beautifully painted.

[Lord_Caerolion]

Use the Word Bearers first logo, an open book with a flame in the centre. 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Use the Word Bearers first logo, an open book with a flame in the centre.

Now that Guilliman has returned and is able to see the symbol of the Order for himself, and as Lord Regent, has the authority to have the Order erased from existence with no questions asked? Too risky. Best alter it slightly, e.g., replace the book with a scroll, or the flame with a sunburst.