#1: The Breaking of the Kurgan

Our settlement had grown large, not through conquest, but through farming. We sustained a population by feeding them while making the proper obeisance to Neiglen, Grandfather Nurgle, who is the god of fecundity as well as the god of decay.

My people had not become soft. The occasional terror of a Chimera attack meant we were always vigilant, and the followers of the Crow God would like little more than to divine their fate by studying our innards.

Yet it was neither beast nor Crow Brethren that saw our destruction. Khorne had looked upon our settlement and found our warrior spirit wanting, for he despises the man who lays down his sword to take up the implements of the farmer, especially when that man is a capable fighter.

The Kurgan horde attacked us in full daylight, giving warning enough to prepare ourselves. Still we suffered many casualties, warriors of the Blood God swiping axes and hellblades in strikes that disembowelled and drew great gouts of blood. They attacked with fury rather than skill, yet somehow the speed and strength of their rage overmatched our discipline, so we knew the Kurgan were favoured indeed.

I was cut down and my guts hit the dirt a heartbeat before my body. As I lay dying, flies began to land upon my exposed vitals. We had always suspected that our tribe carried the favour of Nurgle and as I saw putrefaction spreading across my flesh, I knew the Plague God would hear me. While I prayed, I lost the strength to speak, so I finished the plea in my thoughts.

"Please, Lord Nurgle," I whispered. Flies landed on my face and began to crawl down my throat. It took me a moment to realise they were chewing into my tongue. "Give me the strength to strike back against these blood-mad heathens. Give me the chance to avenge my people and I will serve you."

My child, a voice seemed to say in my head. I could hear flies buzzing madly in my ears, feel them burrowing into my skin to lay their eggs.

My child, I do not abandon faithful servants to the torments of other hells, other deities. Am I not a loving God? Is my intervention not inevitable? I have come to claim you and your people, but you shall serve me with your lives, not your deaths.

As I rose to my feet, still trailing vital organs, I was dimly aware of my wounded kinsmen also standing back up. Jets of blood from severed arteries slowed to sluggish, maggot-infected trickles. Pink skin turned jaundiced greens and yellows. I realised that I and my kinsmen were moaning wordlessly; rebirth was painful and we could feel ourselves rotting within.

"Swine of the Plague God!" bellowed one of the Kurgan. My head turned towards him without conscious control. The daylight was blinding; my eyes felt raw and old. I could see Khorne's favour wrapped around the charging warrior like a red insect, feeding from the man while giving him new strength.

"Come and meet your doom, weakling," I said with a voice made hoarse through illness. My defiance drew a laugh that was more appreciation than derision.

Somehow I had the strength to raise my sword. The Kurgan swung his axe with two hands, yet I parried while holding my blade in just one. My sword had blackened and corroded as my body began to rot, yet somehow, despite its apparent frailty, the blade did not break.

I struck with the speed of a man suffering the excitement of fear, yet I felt little emotion - just a dull, smug happiness, an emotion unfamiliar to me and out of place in a warrior of the Gods. My sword punched into the Kurgan's belly, cleaving muscle and splitting bone. The warrior's body turned black as I pulled my sword back. The mess that collapsed onto the floor looked like it had been dead for days.

"For my Lord Nurgle!" I roared.

We feasted on Kurgan flesh that night. The putrid black slime slid down our throats and gave us relief from the pain in our bodies.

#2: The Scouring of the North

Dolroth Hastling, the lord of our tribe, received a message from our Grandfather: the carcass of a slain beastman turned its head to look at him and spoke in a terrible, slobbering voice. We were ready to make our pilgrimage, not to the Northern Wastes but south, to fester in the heart of the weakling Empire. There would be many trials on our journey south. We set our immediately, encountering many foes as though the Grandfather himself had placed them in our path.

Dolroth led us against the minions of the Blood God in retaliation for their attack on our home. We sought out the Sorcerous Brotherhood of Tzen and made them grovel and eat the corpses of their kin. We humbled Blenda Ethnahan and his warband of Shornaal devotees. They sent daemonic riders to beguile and slay the weakest-willed among us. Yet our senses had dulled under the weight of infection and my kindred fought back, smashing riders from the backs of their beasts and hacking down Shornaal's whelps, killing them quickly to prevent them finding satisfaction in their deaths.

For our part in Blenda's downfall - he was an immensely powerful warlord who had flayed entire tribes with his lash - Dolroth Hastling was rewarded with Nurgle's Rot and became Gutsneer, Chosen of Nurgle. His feet had been set upon the path to daemonhood. He swelled in size, coming to resemble a footsoldier of the Plague God.

Though the following seasons saw us attacked by wrathful followers of the other Gods, the Grandfather blessed us with weapons and magic with which we always triumphed. Dozens of my kin joined their ancestors yet by the grace of Nurgle we always found more men willing to fight for us; those who declined to join our warband were eaten alive by their comrades who were suddenly eager to serve Grandfather Nurgle.

Eventually, we reached the borders of the Empire.

#3: The Order of Carrion

Regretfully, Lord Gutsneer had us avoid an army of Kislevite soldiers and their Ogre allies, for they were ordained to meet the warriors of Khorne, not those of the Fly Lord. Nurgle was speaking to Gutsneer more frequently by now, apparently shunning our seers and sorcerers.

We came across several frontier garrisons of Middenheim men. Their Knights charged us wielding hammers; in the end, some of the Empire men died, some fled, a few joined our ranks. When reinforcing soldiers arrived at the scene of battle long after we had moved on, they saw the state of the bodies and named us the Order of Carrion after an ancient Imperial legend; we know this as Father Nurgle sent it to Lord Gutsneer in a dream. Long did we laugh as he related the fear and horror of the Southlanders.

4#: Feasting on a Broken Heart

As we entered the borders of the Empire, we moved through the great forest, seeking to corrupt the land and perhaps find allies among the beast-kin known to make this place home. We came across a lone elf minstrel singing to himself in a glade. His song was of heartbreak, of a love that had died, leaving him to face thousands of years of life alone.

I personally dragged him, screaming, to my Lord. Gutsneer drank in the minstrel's fear and declared he would find a way to distract the elf from his heartache, and that the elf would never be alone again.

It only took three days of suffering before the minstrel made his choice; this was disappointing, as the Rot had barely started to run its course, but now as one of the countless legions of hell, our newest Plaguebearer will always be among brothers and will always know the love of Nurgle.

#5: Acts of Love

Lord Gutsneer was intrigued that love should hold such sway over mortal creatures. Our shamans crafted a terrible spell, causing our Lord to appear, to those without our patron's Mark, to be a valiant hero of the Empire. For six days he lived among the people of Henderheim. How he loved his new home and its inhabitants!

When he departed, two hundred survivors were left weeping with pain and vomiting blood as disease bloated their frames, and the bride he had taken - within two days of his arrival, no less - bore the spawn of our God, to raise in nine months, should she survive that long.

We will come for her before the birth; she will need the company of her new kin.

#6: The Breaking of the Wild Ones

We found none among the beast-kin who would join our cause. They had been swayed by worshippers of Shornaal, foppish Empire folk taken prisoner by the beastmen. The beast-folk attacked with their lust swaying free. Their magic was potent, a heady perfume that dazzled our senses and left us feeling empty and cold in its absence, yet the Grandfather's love for us is genuine, not some careless falsehood, and we chose reality over empty promises. Blenda Ethnahan himself could not defeat us - there was little that a herd of degenerate scum could do against the power of Grandfather Nurgle.

#7: The Sacking of Domorhaft

A fortified village guarded by trained and motivated peasants proved a source of amusement and a useful recruiting ground. Half the surviving peasants chose to take up arms in Nurgle's name when they saw what we did to those who tried to protect them.

A priest of Sigmar numbered among those who joined us. We would have given him the Rot and forced his induction into a new faith, yet Lord Gutsneer always takes the long view. The man of Sigmar wept openly for his life before his congregation and pointed out those whom he believed - or said he believed - were secret followers of the God of Change. Their guilt, or lack of it, did not matter. We impaled some of them and allowed the rest to become companions of playful Beasts sent to us by the Grandfather.

As reward for such consideration, the Grandfather sent twenty great and mighty warriors to us, their lustrous green armour covered in dents and scratches as proof of their readiness to spread Nurgle's worship by violent means. They were the first of many to join our cause.

#8: The Taking of the Hammer

Lord Gutsneer was granted yet another vision. Following this, he ordered half of our shamans to wrestle one another to the death, to prove that at least some of them were good for entertainment value if little else.

Gutsneer's vision took us East, beyond the borders of the Empire. We prowled the World's Edge Mountains looking to test our might against the Ogres and the beasts of fable said to roam the land. What we found instead was a column of Dwarf soldiers marching to the relief of some stronghold or other.

We fell upon the fools beneath a swarm of crows and flies, hacking and slaying. So great was the slaughter, so badly did inflicted wounds fester, the Grandfather himself sent a mighty host to partake of the entertainment.

The Dwarfs were brave but ultimately their leader, the son of a great king whose name we did not care to know - for all are made equal in the grave - fought our Lord in single combat while daemons and warriors of Nurgle killed their way through his army. The Dwarf swung a hammer of glittering gold which broke Gutsneer's daemon sword. The air itself rippled at the impact and we heard screaming in our minds, then the Dwarf struck again, his hammer crashing upon Gutsneer's breast.

There was the sound as of a great gong being struck. With his own hands, Lord Gutsneer, unharmed by the blow, reached out and plunged his fingers into the Dwarf's eye sockets. As the Dwarf bellowed his agony, Gutsneer breathed directly into his open mouth. Vomit burst from Gutsneer's maw to choke his enemy, who writhed on the floor as maggots grew inside his belly and began to chew.

As Lord Gutsneer held aloft the Dwarfen hammer, corruption began to thread its way through the gold, overcoming whatever enchantments the Dwarfs had placed upon the weapon. Flies began to swarm to the weapon and ever afterwards the weapon trailed clouds of insects behind it with each swing.

Few of Dwarf warriors would escape to reach their kin. Now their kind has something else to lament. We added thirty Dwarfs to our number that day. Some of them still remain alive, seeking death in battle to end their pain, little knowing that death will bring them unimaginable horror. There is no escape from the loving arms of Grandfather Nurgle.

#9: The Shrine of Khorne

Our former Sigmarite priest, now a fanatical devotee of Nurgle, had a vision induced by fever. Raving, glassy-eyed, he exhorted his people and impressed upon Lord Gutsneer that the Crow God had a shrine in a cave beneath the World's Edge Mountains. We found the cave entrance easily enough, shrugging off attacks by sabretusks and strange creatures whose very presence could freeze a man, and descended underground. The warriors to the fore, including myself and Lord Gutsneer, were assailed by minotaurs. Eight Chaos warriors were crushed beneath sledgehammers or trampled beneath hooves, and I took a glancing blow that broke my arm, yet we prevailed.

We pressed on to the shrine. What awaited was a huge icon of Khorne which caused the air to throb with the emotions associated with slaughter. The Sigmarite fool had been duped by a false vision sent by Tzen himself.

Daemons of Khorne materialised around us. We formed a circle around Lord Gutsneer and fought for our souls. Gutsneer brought his hammer crashing against the icon, the sound of metal on metal ringing loud enough to burst eardrums. The daemons fought with frenzy and many of the Carrion host would decorate the Blood God's throne with their skulls.

On the third blow, Gutsneer split the Khornate icon, breaking its power. The daemons roared with fury as they began to fade from existence. Their defeat came at the appropriate time; howling shadows twice the height of a man were denied entry to our world, and we thus escaped the attentions of no less than three Bloodthirsters of Khorne.

The Sigmarite lickspittle was found death like some vermin of Shornaal. He did not deserve to die as a man, so he died as a beast, howling and struggling away on all fours with his mind broken.

#10: Slaying of the Blood Hunt

So great were our victories thus far, the Blood God himself sought to bring our Lord to account. We heard the baying of the Blood Hunt echoing across the land, growing louder with each passing minute. Lesser men would have fallen upon their blades to escape what was coming, yet our Lord hefted his warhammer and shouted for us to stand firm, that we would survive this by standing together as we had always done. Loyalty overcame fear: thus far, our Lord and his patron had kept all their promises to us, putting them far above the servants of other Gods in our estimation.

The daemons which leapt upon us were like dogs, but larger and more terrible by far. They each wore collars which offended my witch-sight and rendered them immune to the spells our sorcerers hurled at them. Even Gutsneer, who had been gifted a fraction of the Grandfather's magical potency, killed only one of the flesh hounds with magic before they leapt upon us.

I killed two, although both were distracted with their jaws around my comrades' necks. Gutsneer swung his hammer left and right, crushing hounds as they leapt through the air. Within two minutes, a score of flesh hounds lay dead and disintegrating and the Order of Carrion – we kept the name our enemies gave us – had survived. Long and loud did the Grandfather celebrate, his laughter carrying throughout the Realm of those Gods we had humbled.

#11: A Frightful Journey

The Grandfather instructed Lord Gutsneer that full daemonhood was within his grasp. We were to follow Nurgle's original plan: return to the heart of the Empire and ensure that its citizens were reduced to screaming wreckage.

Yet something was wrong. The path we followed took us to the edge of destruction. We began to suspect more interference from the God of Change.

It seemed as though all the forces of the world were arranged against us. Hordes of undead things attacked as we neared a place called Sylvania. They slowed us, but we smashed them down, learning to break them into little pieces and speak words of prayer for Nurgle to snatch their roaming souls into the Realm of Chaos – an exorcism of a foul and ironic kind. As the enemy increased in numbers, soon we were speaking any words of exorcism, not just the ones that would empower our patron. As many souls escaped from the love of the Grandfather as from service to the blood-drinkers. Yet tens of thousands more were not freed and they took their wrath out upon our numbers, killing nearly our entire contingent of Empire converts and several of our hardiest warriors.

As we made progress across the land – slow, exhausting, without any firm hope of survival – degenerate humans joined the undead in their attacks against us. We burned their villages in revenge. Spirit hosts swarmed around us, seeking to freeze the hearts of our sorcerers. Ghouls crept from their crypts to leap upon straggling warriors. Creatures of the night riding flying constructs of bone and dried leather swooped down to challenge our greatest fighters. Sheer numbers, and the futility of trying to bring such beings to the worship of Nurgle, led us to divert west of Sylvania lest we expend our strength and fail in our quest.

Even as we left that benighted place, we came under attack from chittering creatures calling themselves Clan Pestilens. These rat-like men were amateurs in the art of spreading illness, misguided as they were by a fumbling, self-absorbed deity known as the Horned Rat, and we returned their gifts of plague a hundredfold. In reward for the havoc we wreaked, Lord Gutsneer and his remaining sorcerers increased in power and we were sent a bellowing, howling Unclean One with its host of daemon servants. Thus emboldened, we carved our way through the rat-things and returned to the bosom of the Empire.

#12: Apotheosis

By now, thousands of souls had been sent to join the Grandfather in his Garden of Rotten Delights. Just as the Grandfather's influence waxes and wanes to mirror the strength of his contagions, the Order of Carrion had grown and shrunk and grown again in the crucible of battle.

Hundreds of daemons and scores of surviving human warriors sacked the town of Badroot. By now, Lord Gutsneer had refined his tactics for recruiting new members to the Order of Carrion: he, and the daemons under his control, upon the capture of a potential servant, would vomit into that servant's mouth, sharing the gift of Nurgle with him or her. Then they were ours, body and soul, forever.

Great was the lamentation as we bested two Imperial forces sent against us, for they carried the Rot back to their garrisons. Grandfather Nurgle rejoiced and sent us another Unclean Lord to join the first.

Apotheosis for Lord Gutsneer – long promised – came when the Imperial humans, desperate to remove our canker from the heart of their Empire, entered a forbidden pact with the God of Blood.

Corrupt magic was unleashed as the Imperial sorcerers betrayed everything their Empire stood for. We did not know, as perhaps we shall never know, how or why they were allowed to unleash the Blood Tide. Screaming, jeering daemons of Khorne descended upon us, led by a Bloodthirster mightier by far than any daemon I have seen or dreamed of. This exalted monster towered over our Unclean Ones, bellowing with wrath as it struck about it, banishing Plaguebearers and killing seasoned warriors of Nurgle with each swing of its axe.

Our magic barely even slowed the Bloodthirster. When some of our men took refuge in a townhouse, the daemon barged straight through the building, crushing everyone inside and then itself rearing from the wreckage unharmed. The Unclean Ones blessed this idol of war with blisters and buboes and disorders of the soul; when they turned the very earth to slime beneath its hooves, the Bloodthirster took to the air.

As our numbers dwindled and men fought back-to-back against the sea of Bloodletters, the Bloodthirster descended upon one of our daemonic overlords. Terrible was the battle. Horrendous were the curses called upon the Khornate daemon by our Unclean Thing. Anyone of either side who moved near the struggling monsters was flattened or swatted far away. Finally, the sheer bloodthirsty strength of Khorne's exalted warrior won the day. Our Unclean avatar collapsed in upon itself with a great farting and vomiting, and the Khornate host, now depleted by magic and steel, roared in triumph.

Yet even as they did so, the Bloodthirster had its leg broken by a single swing of Gutsneer's infected hammer. Our Lord had finished his opponents and closed with the daemonic warrior unseen. Even as the daemon fell to one knee, our second Unclean One whipped its flail around the Bloodthirster's neck and with a single pull, it twisted the daemon's head from its shoulders.

Formidable was this victory, yet so were our losses. Few of us – man or daemon – survived the battle, yet with their figurehead gone and the loss of the sustaining life-force it provided, the daemons of Khorne faded away.

Gutsneer was not solely responsible for the Bloodthirster's destruction, yet our Grandfather is generous, and rewards cleverness, not combat prowess. Both Gutsneer and the surviving Unclean One were surrounded with a miasma of green and yellow light, as if the air itself was bruised and suffering.

When the lights faded, the Unclean One, raised to terrible stature as reward for slaying the Bloodthirster, began to laugh with a voice like thunder.

Lord Gutsneer himself stood twice or three times the height of a man. His armour had changed: now it encased his entire body and was festooned with screaming faces leaking pus. His left hand had been replaced by the barrels of some advanced weapon made from rusting metal, red liquid seeping from the barrels. In his right hand, the hammer had also grown in extent and it throbbed with power, having somehow absorbed the soul of the departed Unclean One.

"Our work here is done," Gutsneer roared. "Come, my children. To the North. The Realm of the Gods awaits us, and a reckoning with the Blood God itself."