The Knight of Caliban grit his teeth. His honor demanded for this war to be done properly, dutifully, with his full commitment.
And yet he remembered the map, the rendition of the galaxy that should belong to mankind, marred with countless blotches of color, each representing a danger to the destiny of man, each showing a rising threat.
They were unlucky, his creator had shared. For they were running out of time and fast. It was not just the Rangda, Krave, Orks and Eldar… Countless breeds were rising to oppose the destiny of man.
And all required resources to bring down. All required time. If he truly wished to do this honorably, if he truly wished to be the First Son, he could not let his honor rise above his duty to preserve mankind.
A shift, a movement in the non-existent wind. A thought that struck his mind.
The Beast of Caliban turned to the space marine who claimed to be his brother, one known as "Alpharius". One who had promised to fill in the gaps as he rebuilt and strengthened his legion.
"I would find it an honor to have you by my side for this campaign."
Great Crusade: War for the Survival of Mankind
"Conquering the world is not easy. And then there are matters of ruling the world after conquering it, preventing insurgency, maintaining order as well as all other problems that come with ruling a host of nations. When one thinks about these things, one realizes that there is hardly a point in conquering the world" - unknown, allegedly Jaghatai Khan.
In the distant days of the thirty-first millennium, the Emperor's Great Crusade carved through the galaxy, subjugating the very stars. The Great Legiones Astartes, led by his sons, unleashed the wrath of mankind upon countless foes. Supported by the might of the Imperial Army, the unmatchable power of God Machines of Mars and countless other militant organizations, they carved through those that would deny the path of mankind.
Millions of worlds were claimed then, either brought back into united human civilization after the Age of Strife or seized from foes of mankind.
Countless alien empires and races were fought, many extinguished from memory, yet others dreadfully remembered, even as their realms turned to ash, such as the horrific Rangda. Even the strongest of such breeds, such as the virulent orks or twisted eldar were bloodied and humbled.
And then, at Ullanor, the Emperor of Mankind announced that he was retiring from commanding his armies and returning to Terra. To many it came as a surprise, for it is said that even after a century of crusading there were realms that posed a threat to humanity. Acknowledging this, the Emperor assigned his exterminator and the greatest commander - Lion El Johnson, primarch of the Dark Angels, to lead the campaign in his absence as the Warmaster.
The Emperor had also chosen the greatest gathering of his sons and their armies to try mending the cracks of doctrine that were appearing between the primarchs. He decreed that Legions could institute a tightly controlled Librarius, though such would be supervised by his agents. Still, he refused to allow the Legions to scavenge technologies of other civilizations en masse, a right kept to Mechanicum alone. To the surprise of his sons he also refused to censure the actions of Word Bearers and to retract the protectorate policy.
After this meeting, the Lord of Mankind departed to Terra followed by Magnus, Perturabo and Leman Russ. The Emperor did not reveal for what purpose he took the Red Cyclops and the Wolf King, but it was no secret Lord of Iron's great intellect was needed to forge the slapdash Imperium into a true shining beacon of mankind.
Perhaps the Lord of Mankind hoped that with his decrees his sons would find their disagreements ended. Yet this meeting only ignited the flames of jealousy and anger that consumed many of the primarchs. While several of them came out of Council at Ullanor affirmed in their actions and beliefs, others felt insulted and betrayed by their father.
The promotion of Lion and Perturabo had a deep effect on Horus Lupercal, Roboute Guilliman and Rogal Dorn, who found themselves spurred as those less fitting were chosen to lead.
For other primarchs a different sort of bitter flame had ignited - for they believed the Imperium was moving from what they desired. It is said that Ferrus Manus, Vulcan, Jaghatai Khan and Mortarion felt that each proclamation was made to censure them in some manner.
But they kept silent then. And for decades after Ullanor the Great Crusade dragged on under the watchful eye of the Lion of Caliban as his brothers grew more and more bitter still.
Countless were the incidents that fed these flames of bitterness.
One such incident occurred after the obliteration of the Diasporex, where Iron Hands, Salamanders and Emperor's Children fought against a coalition of xenos and humans. Upon learning that Vulcan instigated the war Fulgrim nearly came to blows with the black dragon. After the campaign Salamanders proclaimed that they would never fight with such xenophiles, while the Emperor's Children found no other Imperial force truly cared if a powerful potential protectorate was lost.
While caring little for such spats, bitter grew the Iron Hands as they handed over the technology of Diasporex to the Mechanicum. knowing that such marvels would simply rot in hidden vaults.
In another case, on a world known as Davin, Ultramarines and Word Bearers clashed in words, if not yet in blades,. For Roboute Guilliman had pacified the world, its primitive natives surrendering to the demigod. Yet Erebus of Word Bearers, who came to the world during transit, sensed the chaotic corruption of the natives and cleansed the world. When furious Guilliman demanded Lorgar to answer for his crimes, the faithful son tried to explain the threat, only for the Lord of Ultramar to rebuff his claims as superstitions.
While they did not openly clash, Horus did everything in his power to try to undermine Lion's authority. For despite all his admirable traits, the Lord of the 16th saw Lion as nothing more but a warlord from a backwater world.
Thus seeing how Lion held a distaste for the protectorate policy when Luna Wolves encountered the Interex - a human civilization that had taken several xeno races under their protection, Horus Lupercal stayed his hand and attempted to negotiate a peaceful solution.
It was during these negotiations that the Primarch would learn of the existence of the primordial annihilator - Chaos, its weapons and the threats that it posed. While initially unwilling to believe that such a truth was hidden from him, with time Horus was convinced. And in horror he had realized that Dark Angels had been using corrupted weapons during their campaign against the Nephilim.
With this revelation and protectorate status for Interex secured, Horus moved towards Terra to question his father on why the First allowed such weapons. For at the time Lord of 16th merely assumed that it was but one more secret weapon allowed for the Dark Angels.
To the disbelief of the Lord of the Luna wolves, his father had been surprised to learn of his warmaster using such powers in their campaigns.
Through psychic channels the Emperor and Magnus sent a message to Lion El' Jonhson to return to Terra. Yet the warmaster, crusading in eastern fringes against the barghesi, answered that he would not abandon the campaign. In response, the Emperor ordered Night Lords and Raven Guard, fresh from Carnea campaign, to convince or force the master to follow the order.
The Master of Mankind believed that together the legions could match the Dark Angels if force became needed. Furthermore, both Legions used sanctioned librarians and were surveyed by Custodes and Sisters of Silence, thus the Emperor believed in their loyalty.
And yet the great enemy played its hand well. For the Master of Mankind had been mistaken…
The Hammer Falls
"We all bear witness to a final truth - our way is not the way of the Imperium. You have never stood in the Emperor's "light". Never worn the Imperial eagle. And you never will. You shall stand in midnight clad, your claws red with the lifeblood of my father's pet tyrants. Now rise, my sons, and take your wrath across the stars. And even if we fall before the walls of Terra, death is nothing compared to vindication" - Konrad Curze, Primarch of the Night Lords.
Despite the faith put in them by their father, it is said that when Konrad Curze and Corvus Corax reached Lion, they knelt to him and swore oaths of loyalty to the warmaster.
After this, as if to dispel any doubt, Lion sent an astropathic proclamation. In it he accused the Emperor of hypocrisy, refusing his sons the usage of weapons necessary to secure a future for mankind while indulging in forbidden technologies for selfish projects of grandeur. The warmaster further proclaimed that the Emperor stole power from the gods to unleash "beasts'' upon the galaxy.
To the inquisition, which had spent millenia analyzing these events, it's clear that Lion had come under belief that the creation of primarchs was done by the usage of chaotic energies and that it was proof, that only by embracing the connection to the Empyrean could they save humanity from destruction. Furthermore, something in his mind connected the Lord of Mankind trying to protect his flock from the horrors of Xeno and Chaotic technologies with unwillingness to save it.
While at this point the sheer extent of the corruption the Lord of Angels had spawned was not known, across the galaxy, another horror was unleashed upon the loyal sons of the Emperor. For Prospero, the home of the Thousand Sons, had come under assault from none other than the Death Guard. Mortarion pitted his sons against an unlikely alliance - not only forces of the fifteenth and Spire Guard but also a contingent of Space Wolves who were supervising the world.
Prospero burned as the best efforts of Thousand Sons under Ahzek Ahriman and Space Wolves under Othere Wyrdmake failed against the wrath of Mortarion, whose presence alone negated any power of the Empyrean. Had such a battle happened in any other era, both the populace and the garrison would have been extinguished, but by unbelievable arcane might The Emperor, together with his sons, opened a gateway that allowed the ragged survivors to flee to Terra.
In reaction to this, the Master of Mankind and his Pretorian sent out orders to whoever would answer. In response they either received silence or worse - proclamations, for Legion after Legion and primarch after primarch announced their loyalty to the Warmaster.
In the end it was clear, only Iron Warriors, Luna Wolves, War Hounds, Word Bearers, Space Wolves, Thousand Sons and a scattering of blackshields had remained loyal
Blackshields
Most of his sons had turned against the Empero, yet not all of their legionnaires followed them into damnation. Some had defied the corrupting influence of their primarchs and evaded their deadly blows, remaining loyal even as their brothers were corrupted by dark forces.
These "blackshield" units, sometimes as miniscule as companies or even squads, yet in other cases as large as several chapters chose to discard their legionary allegiance, painting over the symbols that had defined them for decades or centuries with the black of the void.
While many marines took up the black believing that only in death they could be redeemed, the order of Perturabo that came after their confirmation of loyalty was clear - such action would be a waste of resources and an insult to the Emperor who had forgiven them. Thus, humbled by the forgiveness of the Master of Mankind and inspired by the Lord of Iron, the blackshields chose to fight the long war.
These forces fought across every front of the Leonine Treachery, often facing their own traitorous brothers and in some cases even attempting to assassinate their own fallen gene-sires.
Scattered and cut off from supply chains, many blackshields resorted to techno heresies, terror tactics, looting, pillaging and even consorting with xenos far beyond what was permissible just to maintain fighting forces. While many damned themselves in such a manner, most of these revenants remained loyal through the war, even proving instrumental during countless battles.
One of the forces that answered the calls surprised both the Lord of Mankind and his sons. For among those who affirmed loyalty were Luther and the Calibanite Dark Angels. Isolated for decades these astartes had continued building up and protecting nearby systems, untouched by corruption of their genesire. As Lion had switched from waiting for Calibanite reinforcements and forged new marines from conquered populations, the garrison swelled, until it numbered in tens of thousands, adding a force nearly equal to smaller legions to the loyalist cause.
The March to Terra
"I was never a hunter. I was ever and only the beast among beasts. The slayer of creatures I thought worse than myself" - Lion El' Johnson.
Even with confirmation that there were still some loyalists in the sea of mad betrayal, the southern side of the galaxy, if such a term can even be used in the great vastness of space, was open for the traitors.
Furthermore, as Lion began to advance towards Terra, more and more forces joined him, with entire realms built by now traitor legions and mechanicum worlds subverted by Ferrurs Manus switching to the Warmasters' cause.
This forced even many systems with no love for Emperor's Executioneer to make a choice. Many, intimidated by the power of 12 legions, untold masses of the Imperial army and even titan legions pledged themselves to the Warmaster. Others - despite the grim situation and impossible odds, refused to bend, even if their defiance would give the Emperor and his Pretorian but a few more moments.
Yet such worlds and systems would not be left to face darkness alone. For there were still those that would come to their aid.
Iron Warriors were the most numerous of the loyalist legions and so the grim sons of Perturabo fought grueling battles of attrition on a thousand worlds. Though undoubtedly instrumental in Imperial victory, the worlds where Iron Warriors fought still speak bitterly of the sons of Olympia, whose brutality could sometimes be compared to those of traitors.
In opposition to their methods were the Word Bearers. It is said that any world where the sons of Lorgar set foot fought with ferocity unmatched, their populaces singing holy hymns and manifesting miracles as they held back the dark tides. The sacrifices of these noble sons are mourned even in the 41st millennium, for the Word Bearers fought for every man, woman and child upon even the most doomed of worlds.
Often with them fought the War Hounds, who matched the monsters of the traitors with their own ferocity. Even such terrors as the abominable intelligences of Lion and Manus found themselves outmatched by the fury of butchers of Nuceria, whose augmented forms carved through even other astartes with ease.
In spite of the long loyalist retreat that defined most of the Treachery, Luna Wolves and Knights of Caliban sought to steal the initiative from the traitors. It was they that struck Medusa, breaking its defense fleet and besieging it. It was they that slowed down the Blood Angel march through Segmentum Obscurus. And it was the forces of Horus and Luther that beat back the attempt of traitors located in the Intwit cluster to carve a pathway to Terra for their lord - Rogal Dorn.
Of the Space Wolf deployments before the Years of the Wolves little is known, even for the agents of the Inquisition, though the Legion was depleted in battles now lost to history. Not even the Rout themselves boast of what they fought, for the horrors of these clashes eroded the very joy of battle that defined their legion.
Similarly little is known of the Thousands Sons, who together with assassins and agents of the Sigilite battled against an overwhelming tide of subversives, infiltrators and fake revolutionaries of 3 entire legions, their psychic mastery cutting through the layers of lies with ease.
During those dark days even forces of Custodians and Sisters of Silence left Terra en masse, deploying upon worlds that could not be allowed to remain under traitor control. Such a force fought the Second and Third Battles of Prospero, where they butchered tens of thousands of traitor legionnaires belonging to the Death Guard, Ultramarines and Imperial Fists (Though by that time the name of Soul Drinkers was already being embraced by the legion).
Countless other loyalist forces fought the traitors, such as the legendary tank masters of Tallarn who engaged Raven Guard in the greatest armored clash in history or the legendary Geno Five-Two Chiliad who battled Alpha Legion upon Nurth and forced the traitors to obliterate it's biosphere to achieve a hollow victory.
Yet, even against such ferocity, will and faith, the 12 traitor legions ground onwards.
Perhaps, had these forces been united, the loyalists would have shattered and Terra would be taken early and easily. However, despite the might of the Warmaster, he could not control most of his brothers and thus many legions simply scattered across the galaxy, seeking their own objectives, only Ultramarines and Iron Hands remaining by his side.
Imperial Fists split into dozens of crusades, each seeking to achieve their own idea of pain filled perfection. Some sought to retake the besieged Inwit cluster, others charged at every Iron Warrior fortress they could, purely for the thrill of breaching it. Some even moved towards Prospero to partake in the pain of dead psykers that still echoed through the planet. And later, as Custodes came to take the world, to experience the pain born of dueling such perfect trashumans.
The Death Guard raged at every world that tolerated the existence of psykers. No matter the strategic worth of such systems, to Mortarion they were an insult to humanity. Trillions perished in mad purges that held little benefit to the traitor cause. One such example of the insanity that had gripped the legion was refusal to give up the devastated Prospero to Custodes and even attempting to retake it after being forced off the dead world.
Night Lords scattered into a thousand warbands and spread out across imperial worlds, instilling billions with revolutionary fervor. Entire planets rose up under the sons of Kurze as the delusion of a galactic "liberation" that plagued the Night King was enacted and anarchy reigned in a thousand systems.
Blood Angels partook little in the excesses of other legions. For they sought the greatness of worthy foes and thus tried to surge towards Terra as soon as possible, ignoring any strategic objectives. Still, in their mad quest they slew countless great warriors, quenching their thirst in the blood of heroes.
White Scars simply shattered, for their corruption was deep and Jaghatai Khan ordered his sons to seek their own freedom. And though the Wild Rider of Chogoris put on a facade of being a first among equals, the unspoken command was "Be there at Terra". Still, the Scars spent much of the Treachery as little more than pirates.
Corvus Corax and his Raven Guard scoured the galaxy for artifacts that would give them strength they had always desired. Rarely did the ravenlord turn his attention to loyalist planets, and even then always seeking for lost treasures. But when he did, the worlds would tremble as tens of thousands of thinbloods marched across the land and great armored columns ground all into dust.
As other traitors marched to Terra, the Emperor's Children and Salamanders fought each other in a brutal war across the systems belonging to Interex. For Lion had ordered Fulgrim to subvert the civilization to his cause. At the same time, he sent the recently fallen Vulkan to beat back the xeno armies that were already encroaching on human territory.
In fact, together with the Salamanders, many traitor forces, including great swathes of Ultramarines, Dark Angels and other Legions whose homeworlds laid nearby xeno territory, were kept back for such a task, for the Warmaster refused to give up any gains of mankind to the alien.
Still, for reasons at the time only known to him, Vulkan aimed the brunt of his Legion at Interex, refusing to listen to the Phoenician, whose deals and alliances with Eldar and other xenos he despised. Caught in-between this, Interex civilization was nearly obliterated.
And of what schemes Alpha legion was perpetuating… Perhaps only Magnus and the Sigilite knew.
Still, even as most legions sought their own goals, the Imperial lines buckled and broke again and again, loyalists thrown back against impossible adds. At moments it seemed that even with Perturabo, Malcador and Magnus working together, Sol could not be prepared in time…
And then the wolves howled…
Years of the Wolves
"And what great armies we give our father! Pups whose claws are yet to be bloodied, yet to rend flesh and feral dogs whose snouts have to be chained lest they tear apart their own brothers" - Leman Russ.
While War Hounds, Luna Wolves, Space Wolves had deployed most of their legions to the frontlines, their primarchs only rarely fought against the traitors, for a greater task awaited them as the Selenar gene cults rose up in defiance of the Emperor.
Lunar revolts
The knowledge of how long the Lion had been preparing for his betrayal is a mystery lost to time. Yet the networks of spies and allies he created within the Imperium reveal that without doubt, it had been a work of decades. Such seeping corruption was unmasked during the opening days of the Treachery.
While the schism of the Mechanicum upon Mars itself is the most famous, the Lunar revolt is no less important. For the Selenar Gene-cults, bitter and hateful towards the loyalist Luna Wolves, turned against the Emperor and aligned themselves with the Warmaster early in the cursed war. Hidden deep within the satellite, shielded from the eyes of the Lord of Mankind they had cultivated both armies of horrors and forged weapons of war. It seems the genewitches had hoped that with Inwit and Medusa so close to Terra, Warmasters victory would be swift.
Yet, due to actions of loyalist primarchs this did not transpire. And after he was done containing Medusa and Inwit, Horus turned his eyes to Luna.
The war was short, but brutal. Horus, Leman Russ and Magnus landed on Luna with only a few thousand astartes. Thus the war was mostly fought by Solar Auxilia, which perished in their millions on the moon against bio-engineered horrors forged to fight astartes.
It is said that without the will of Horus holding together this army, the mortal forces would have broken and shattered. And in the same vein it's believed that without Russ and Magnus the moon could never have been taken.
Perhaps, in another world, where the Wolf King and the Cyclops didn't learn the lessons their sons treasure till this day, Selenar cults could have endured. For Magnus and Russ carved through entire armies with psychic powers and physical might, legions of abominations falling beneath their swords and empyrean storms.
Still, it took years before the Gene-Witches of Luna were extinguished.
While all space marine forces, traitors and loyalists alike, used methods to make pseudo-marines or "thinbloods", what was done by Angron, Russ and Horus went far beyond such methods. Using Selenar cloning vats, gene knowledge of the witches and secrets that the Emperor entrusted them, the primarchs made abominations in the shape of men, surpassing even the horrors of Corax.
For years they prepared. And when their armies were complete, the three brothers struck at the world upon which Lion gathered forces to besiege the Beta Gammon cluster - Yarath Maximal.
Million strong armies of pseudo-marines fell unto the traitors like the wrath of the Emperor himself. Supported by thousands of true astartes, the abominations drowned traitor marines in their numbers, while armies of mortals crumbled beneath monstrosities forged from superhuman flesh.
Struck by the ferocity of the abominations, the Yarath-Maximal system became a grueling battle of attrition. While Lion could retreat, he knew that such action would shatter what little unity remained among the traitors. As such he had to fight and win, something that the loyalists gambled on.
For years the bloodbath raged, trillions perishing. At times it seemed loyalists would carve out a victory, only for more traitors to arrive. Some traitor primarchs threw themselves into battle to protect their domains from obliteration, for the system laid upon the pathways that if taken would allow the wrath of the loyalists to fall upon traitor domains. Others, lost to madness, had to be dragged to the fight by Ferrus Manus or the Lion himself while Roboute Guilliman managed the front in their absence.
Seemingly against all odds, against all reason, even as they faced 9 legions and their primarchs, Russ, Angron and Horus managed to hold the traitors for 5 years, forcing them to bleed veterans of centuries long campaigns. Yet even the ferocity of the primarch crafted abominations could not match the might of the traitor titans, whose arrival ensured Lord of Ultramar took his victory.
Still, even when the loyalists shattered, with Leman Russ being cut off from allied forces and forced to flee further from Terra, their sacrifices had given Perturabo the time he needed.
For the Lord of Iron had fortified Beta Garmon for another bloodbath and was closing his protective fist of steel around Sol itself.
The Siege of Terra
"We endured because the flames inside us raged harder than the ones around us" - unknown saint during the Siege of Terra.
After the victory at Yarath-Maximal Lion tried to surge forwards to the homeworld of mankind, only to find himself engaged in a similarly costly battle of Beta Garmon, for against them were arrayed Iron Warriors, Word Bearers, Imperial Army forces, Titan Legions, Skitarii and even Emperor's own Custodians, under the command of none other than the holy son - Lorgar Aurelian.
The Warmaster bled for years more to take Beta Garmon, though Perturabo, in his arrogance, had overextended as he assisted Lorgar's stand. Thus when Beta Garmon fell, any forces left had to fall back to Sol system itself, letting traitors run wild across Sol Sector. And most shamefully to the Lord of Iron, he couldn't stop Rogal Dorn from taking back the Inwit cluster.
Neither could he or any other loyalist force present stop the Arch Traitor from raining hatred upon Caliban…
Despite the best preparations of the loyalists, Caliban held out for merely days. Its armies were massacred, fortresses razed. Even when Luther and his best warriors confronted the Warmaster, they found themselves outmatched, surviving only due to a miscalculation as the world collapsed from orbital bombardment.
Not waiting for his enemies to regain their bearings, Lion struck the Sol System.
The wrath of 12 Legions fell unto the cradle of mankind.. The assault had been timed with an exceptional phenomenon unseen for millenia - all 9 true planets of the solar system aligning in a stellar line.
Yet as the grand traitor armada emerged at Pluto, Perturabo reminded them that the Sol System was only considered to have 9 planets out of tradition. For the Lord of Iron had built up a thousand thousand mining and production facilities and even voidfleet bases upon the small dwarf planets and Oort Cloud that lay beyond the Frost Zone of the Sol System. And from these dead places the outer Sol Fleet and its millions of sacrificial soldiers struck.
At the same time, in front of the traitors waited thousands of miles of void mines and hardened battle servitors made from the billions of prisoners that were unlucky to find themselves in the solar system during the Treachery. And beyond them, laid the forces of the outer Sol fleet and trillions stationed on dead frozen worlds.
Even such an encirclement could not slow down the Warmaster. But it is said that the grand cost of breaking out of the trap greatly angered Roboute Guilliman.
Yet as they broke the outer solar system, the traitors were forced to confront the fact that autonomous forces were stationed on every world and object that could be built up to house soldiers or produce equipment. Perturabo knew that these trillions of soldiers would die and yet his intent was clear to Lion and his generals. They would have to grind these forces to ash or be forced to fight on a dozen fronts.
And thus to finally strike Terra the traitors had to hound the entire Sol System, from Pluto where replicated cyborgs of the native technocracy fought them in the cold and dark tunnels to Mercury where machines dueled traitor astartes and mortal armies succumbed to the heat.
From the orbits of gas giants, where ships were torn apart by storms and millions died for tiny islands of ice to minor bodies like Ceres where incomprehensible failures of marine inductions of both sides battled in the tunnels.
The genius mind of Perturabo had even found ways to hide production facilities and vessels in the outer layers of the Sol itself. These fleets harassed the traitors till the end of the siege, even assisting Leman Russ in breaking the blockade around Terra after the traitor unity shattered.
Only Mars fell to the traitors easily, for Perturabo had underestimated the remaining forces of Dark Mechanicum, which gathered great armies in the depths of the red world.
Beyond this exception, other celestial bodies had to be cleansed by traitors or remained zones of conflict to the end of the Siege. This included Luna, which angered the Lion, for instead of Selenar allies, the tunnels of the satellite were filled with loyalist War Hounds and Luna Wolves.
Yet despite all of this, despite being pitted again against an entire solar system made into a great forge of war using forbidden sciences, against trillions of soldiers, against millions of thin blooded space marines and hundreds of thousands trueborn, against tens of thousands of ships and defense stations, Lion carved through it all and eventually, his forces befell Terra.
He found the homeworld of man filled with bunkers, military emplacements and barricaded hive cities. These fortifications were held by untold ranks of Solar Auxilia and Luciferian Blacks - the very elite of the Imperial Army, together with thousands of true marines and many times more of thinbloods. The Warmaster would have to scour this world too if he wanted it.
While Lion led the traitor effort in the siege, Roboute Guilliman commanded the thousand fronts that had emerged across the world. On the loyalist side, it was Horus that would take over the leadership of the defenders of the Imperial palace, while Perturabo, using his great intellect and connection to a million communication systems, scattered orders to the loyalists across the world.
Initially it seemed that despite the presence of only 4 loyalist primarchs in the battle: Horus, Lorgar, Angron and Magnus, the magnificence of the Emperor would shift the tide. For the Lord of Mankind slew a dozen dozen chaos champions in the first hours of the battle, extinguishing demon princes, obliterating abominable automatons and even crippling one of his own suns - Ferrus Manus. It is believed that during these early stages the Emperor also wounded both Rogal Dorn and Vulkan so greatly that both were forced to retreat from the siege, though even the flame of righteousness could not keep the Black Dragon down.
Perhaps fearing the decimation of his generals, Lion reacted to this with a vile deed that remains unmatched by any traitor - with the sacrifice of an entire hive city and sorceries of the Alpha Legion, he struck the webway project with impossible ferocity, collapsing entire ethereal tunnels that shielded the realm from the warp, unleashing an incomprehensible horde of demons into it. While even previously the Imperial webway had been periodically besieged by Fulgrim's forces, the armies of Phoenician paled in comparison to the hordes of Empyrean.
Thus the Master of Mankind, together with Magnus, his Custodes, Sisters of Silence, chapters worth of Thousand Sons and millions of Luciferian Blacks had to retreat into the depths of the palace to prevent the demonic hosts from spilling unto Terra.
At the same time, three more strikes fell. For the Soul Drinkers and Salamanders, using their knowledge of siege and tunnel warfare carved a path beneath the Imperial palace into the very heart of the great complex. Above ground Sanguinius struck down Angron, driving his sons into suicidal madness and rising to demonhood. And distantly from where the battle for the Imperial palace was raging, Iron Hands encircled and besieged the Ural fortresses and factories of Terrawat clans, obliterating the Baltika mustering point, ensuring that from Nordyc to Nordafrika, loyalist forces would be cut off from supply.
Even as order seemed to collapse everywhere, the soldiers of the Imperium, be they men or transhumans fought without a fear in their hearts. Against impossible odds, against legions of traitors and mutants, even as ammo ran out and they were reduced to fighting with bayonets and knives, they endured. Countless saints were said to manifest that day as simple mortal men stood against transhumans and countless stories would be told of singular astartes holding back entire companies of traitor spawn from harming innocents, odes to the Emperor upon their lips.
While Horus demanded the Lord of Iron to retreat whatever forces he could and concentrate them around the Imperial palace, Perturabo refused. The Tyrant of Olympia would not give up ground and leave entire armies, except Antarctica under Luther and Pan-Pacific under Lorgar, to die. Rather, using the permissions he had gained from the Lord of Mankind as the Pretorian, he cursed Terra and unleashed forces darker than what even traitors were ready to use.
Living weapons, such as the proto-primarch Angel, that even the Emperor himself deemed too dangerous, self-replicating Abominable intelligences that Perturabo had chained with logic itself, xenotic abominations of long forgotten days and countless uniquely horrific beasts were unleashed against the traitors, turning the tide of not only the siege of Imperial palace but war for Terra itself.
Furthermore, the Lord of Iron unsealed arsenals and secret stockpiles to his sons, unleashing weapons of terrible potency on the very homeworld of man. Some of these were crude things - miniature nuclear devices, which burned marines within their armor, while others were horrors of the Machine rebellion - beams that erased the very information of their targets, blades that devoured the souls of any they struck and even entropy weapons.
While traitor astartes and their primarchs had fought similar monstrosities and had learned how to survive such weapons during the Great Crusade, and Lion himself fielded abominable intelligences, the sheer amount of destruction unleashed was beyond even their madness.
Billions of traitors died to the Men of Iron, their frontlines shattered as even space marines fled against tides of metal things. Not even the emperor's own sons were spared brutality, for his Angel, in it's maddening power, outmatched several traitor primarchs, brutalizing Vulkan, who despite his perpetual nature had to ascend to survive, deeply wounding Corvus Corax and even achieving mutual destruction with Sanguinius during what was known as the Duel of Angels.
While the proto-primarch perished, his rampage left the traitors reeling and near breaking point. To stop the shifting tide, Roboute Guilliman was forced to take up control in a far more direct manner. This was a mistake however, for the idea of traitor unity only held for some of these demigods as long as they could run wild. Yet now, as the previous vague commands that were followed out of respect and friendship turned into barking orders, the ideas of some shifted.
After seemingly finally seeing El Johnson as the tyrant and monster he was, Konrad Kurze and Jaghatai Khan rose against him. While this counter-rebellion was short-lived, for disorganized and surrounded the Night Lords and White Scars fell in their tens of thousands, their madness left a hole in the blockade around the Throneworld.
Using this advantage, Leman Russ struck. The Space Wolves had always bolstered a greater fleet than most other legions. And above the throneworld, this great armada was joined by both the disparate blackshields that Lord of Fenris gathered during his surge towards Terra and the remaining feets of Sol.
The voidships struck the weakened blockade like the spear of All-Father, igniting a fierce battle over the skies of the Throneworld as thousands of black drop pods rained from the skies, unleashing the wrath of sons betrayed by their fathers.
With the tide shifting even more into their favor, forces within the Imperial palace surged outwards, down the Ind Plateu where Lion and Roboute Guilliman built a great forward operation fortress. With the Emperor himself leading the charge, followed by Perturabo, Horus and Magnus it was clear - Lion's cause was failing.
The Confrontation
Even to the most experienced Inquisitor Lords and Army commander it is unknown why the Emperor chose such a bold strategy. For Lorgar had held the forces of Pan-Pacific with faith alone, while the will of Luther prevented Antarctica from falling and the landing of Russ reinvigorated the Evropa and Nordafrika battlegroups. Thus, warmasters during the long millenia have concluded a slow grind would have been better than such a mad push.
Some believe that perhaps the Emperor was trying to save Terra from what would become its fate. Yet those among Ordo Malleus point to the confrontation between the Emperor and the Arch Traitor and the weakening lines between material and empyrean. They claim that had the Emperor not confronted Lion, the victory of the "Battle of Mortals" would not matter, for upon gaining demonic armies the Arch traitor could still take Terra.
Still, with traitor forces shattering, the Lord of Mankind carved his way to the Lion's bunker. While no normal fortress could have stopped the Emperor, this was a construct only half-material and commanded by none other than Rogal Dorn, who despite his brutalized form held it with all the stubbornness he was known for. Thus Perturabo had to command a counter-siege to tie up the lord of Soul Drinkers and their elite, even as existence devouring weaponry tore through the walls of the fortress, allowing his father to advance.
By some unknown power the fortress scattered the Imperial forces entering it, which nearly instantly found themselves engaged by warriors of Alpha Legion, Ultramarines and Dark Angels.
Despite the fact that only the Emperor and Magnus seemed to be able to carve through the madness of the bunker, it was the battered Horus that found the Lion first.
While it is said that Horus had fought the Lion bravely and weakened the Warmaster, it is not known if such is the truth. For when the Emperor entered the center of the bunker with his Custodes and whatever troops he had left, Horus laid slain, pinned to the ground with a sword through his heart. The sire of the Luna Wolves was great, but he was still of flesh of man and the Lion was now a force beyond any mortal creature.
As space marines battled around them and Custodes fought possessed abominations and demons, the Emperor and Lion clashed with their blades and their minds.
Yet, to the horror of the Custodes which they would not forget even ten thousand years later - the Lion turned out to be greater than the Emperor. For it seemed whatever dark gifts and xenos technologies the Arch Traitor had used, they turned his power truly great and terrible.
Slowly, the master of mankind lost ground, his armor and flesh torn apart by his son.
And then, to the ultimate despair of the loyalist present, the Lion cut off the Emperor's right hand, ridding the lord of mankind from his flaming blade and plunged his blade through the heart of his Father.
Only by being the One above all other men did the Lord of the Imperium survive this, though it was no doubt that he was crippled as he collapsed onto the ground, barely drawing breath.
Quickly did his soldiers and guardians rush to save their lord, pushing the Lion back with sheer mass. But it was in vain, for the traitor simply swatted them like they were nothing but ants.
Until one.
For in the seemingly darkest hour a lone warrior stood against the monster - the knightess of Caliban only known as the Maiden - Lion's very own sister and former squire. Upon seeing her, the arch traitor stopped his march, yet only for a second, for the Beast of Caliban extinguished the knightess, burning not only her flesh and soul, but even the very memory of her very existence. Only by their unbreaking wills would the Emperor and his truest champions remember this sacrifice.
Upon seeing such a noble soul - a mere human, standing against a monstrous demigod, fearless and defiant, obliterated from existence, the Emperor raged. In this anger, the master of mankind summoned great power, born of the sacrifices of every noble man and woman upon Terra and struck the Lion with the same fate - erasing his body and soul from existence.
All of Throneworld felt the extinguishment of the Lion and for the traitors it was clear - their chance had slipped. And so they fled like rats, leaving whatever stragglers couldn't catch up to their fates.
The battle had been won.
The Emperor, however, was dying. Neither His own psychic power, nor the power of Magnus, who found him after banishing the abomination that once was Alpharius-Omegon, could heal his body or his soul, for the sword that Lion pierced him with was a terrible thing.
Perhaps, had Malcador been whole, together with Magnus they could have saved the Master of mankind. But while the Emperor engaged his son, the Grand Regent had nearly succumbed to the drain of the Golden Throne. While the Sigilite would retain his perpetual status, his psychic power and perhaps his very soul had been devoured by the apparatus.
Thus, with heavy hearts Perturabo and Magnus put their father onto the Golden Throne, activating its mechanisms and the stasis fields. Upon there He sits till now, endlessly battling the influence of the Chaos Gods over the souls of man and weeping for a dead dream.
The Leonine Treachery was over, the time had come for Reforging.
The Long War
"Things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth" - ancient Albian wisdom.
With the Emperor now lost to His subjects, two of His loyal sons dead, the Sigilite reduced from an existence beyond man to a mere crone and His very Throneworld reduced to ash by the spite of his Pretorian, a new order had to come.
With Terra reduced to rubble, a third of it covered with rad deserts, its already fragile atmosphere quickly turning to nothing and AI horrors that broke Perturabo's chains crawling at every ruin, much of the planet had to be abandoned. Thus Luna became the new center of the Imperium, as Malcador and his council moved there, haphazardly retaking governance of a shattered empire.
With Malcador recovering from his ordeal and Perturabo split between rebuilding the solar system and beating down the horrors of Terra, other leaders were needed.
Leman Russ, Lorgar Aurelian and Magnus the Red - The Triarchy, stepped up to secure the Imperium. Reform could come, but first the traitors needed to be struck down. Thus fleets were cobbled together from whatever ships remained and armies were forged from veterans of the Solar War.
However, even the short period of gathering the necessary forces had taken too long in some cases. For using fell sorceries Inwit cluster was turned into a warp storm by Rogal Dorn. As the loyalists advanced they had found that similar rituals were performed by Blood Knights, who surrounded Ba'al' in a "Crimson Curtain", and even Raven Guard, who hid the entire Forsarr Sector in a shadowy warpstorm of putrid black. Though nothing felt as insulting as the monstrousness of Guilliman, who cast the great Ruinstorm around Ultramal, seizing the 500 worlds from the realspace.
Salamanders on the other hand, made a stranger choice by far. Vulkan, by some impossible power, teleported the Nocturne system wholesale into the Eye of Terror, where it remains still.
Other traitors could not shield their domains in such a manner. Fulgrim ignored Chemos in his flight towards the Eye of Terror and the world was purged by the Sigiltes. While the decimated White Scars and Night Lords tried to defend their homeworlds, Nostramo and Chogoris were turned to ash by wrathful Lorgar who deemed that chaotic delusion consumed their populaces.
While other primarchs fled or hid, two were exceptional - the headstrong Ferrus Manus and the wrathful Mortarion.
Medusa had been besieged by Calibanite Knights and Luna Wolves since the start of the Treachery. While some suggested they be withdrawn to Terra, it was not done. Thus when Ferrus Manus and his traitorous priests of Mars came to take the world, they found not a secure domain, but a world besieged, one where armored columns hunted each other across the great empty plains and siege tanks dueled beneath the great legion fortresses.
As the presence of the primarch nearly flipped the balance to the favor of the traitors, Perturabo himself responded to the pleas of the loyalists and came in force. It is said that the two Lords of Iron Clashed within Spukkari, the dark desert where Ferrus Manus once bested the great silver wyrm and the lord of the hands found himself outmatched. Manus was forced to flee and Medusa fell to the loyalists.
Around the same time Magnus confronted Mortarion on Barbarus. While Imperial Army commanders requested the primarch simply bombard the world, the Red Cyclops and his sons sought vengeance for Prospero. Thus they descended onto the planet and cleansed it with warp fire and even the anti-psyker powers of the Death Lord failed against his brother's ire.
Be it fleeing in fear or being pushed back in defiance, traitor legions which could not turn their domains into warp storms found themselves pushed into the Eye of Terror or Maelstorm.
The wars of reforging took centuries, for countless systems remained in rebellion, even as the traitor primarchs fled or hid. These conflicts were brutal affairs as forces of the Imperial Army and their traitorous counterparts clashed in their millions across planet wide trenches. Still without the guidance of Lion or Guilliman and Leman Russ leading the loyalists, these armies broke, scuttling after their overlords into the warp storms.
Unable to pursue the traitors, the Imperium built great fortresses around these damned storms, preparing to hold back any invasions by abominations living or ethereal upon fortress worlds or fortified space stations. Perturabo dubbed these 5 formations "The Iron Cages", after once remarking how he would lock his hated brother Dorn in such.
Still, both the Treachery and Reforging had shown that the Imperium could not persist as it had done during the Great Crusade.
The entire mythos of space marines had shattered, old traumas they had inflicted on pacified populations resurfaced. Thus, under the guidance of Magnus and Lorgar, Astartes and Imperial Army forces were drawn closer together, proper command and communication lines drawn between them. Never again would these champions of mankind fight in the dark, where dread forces could corrode them.
Still, under the insistence of Leman Russ and Luther, while integrated into the Imperial warmachine, the space marines would continue waging their wars in their own unique ways.
Furthermore, after waging war with them during both the Siege of Terra and Reforging, Leman Russ, using the authority of the Emperor's Executioner, pardoned the surviving blackshields.
Under the approval of Malcador he allowed them to reform into their own Great Companies up to ten thousand marines. While this "Second Founding '' resulted in hundreds of such formations, most of them were as small as a few dozen astartes, and in some cases, like Sons of Medusa, as minute as a handful of brothers. Only with centuries would these grow back into true armies.
But the reshaping hands of the primarchs didn't stop with the Legions, for the Imperial Army was similarly remolded. Unexpectedly, such a plan came from one often branded as a barbarian - Leman Russ. For he led the mortal armies during the Reforging and experienced its countless failures. During the great crusade most of the armies of Imperium were cobbled together, as commanders simply assumed these forces would conscript and loot as they marched.
Perhaps for taking weak worlds, crippled by the legions, this was acceptable, but such armies turned to dust against true enemies. Thus the Wolf Lord reshaped the horde, basing it around a system of banners and templates, similar to one he had instituted upon Fenris. No longer would worlds stand reliant on disorganized garrisons and no longer would castle worlds, integral to warp travel and production, would rely on whatever was available, for the Grand Brotherhoods of the Imperial Army would shield them all.
To continue the fight against corruption, the Inquisition was formed by Malcador. While initially the Sigilite believed in an organization of individuals, the shadow war against the Alpha Legion had shown the truth. While the order remained decentralized to evade corruption, its recruiting was expanded. Furthermore, several military orders, space marine great companies and other forces were aligned specifically to inquisitorial service. While no proof exists, it is a rumor that Magnus the Red was instrumental in preparing these "Talons of the Emperor" for the long war.
Other primarchs and their sons despised the implication of this - that after centuries of waging war against traitors they could still fall. Yet, as thousands of marines have fallen during the millenia, such suspicion was well founded. Still, as later events like Years of Shame and Age of Apostasy would show, that even the watchers themselves could be blind.
With faith shown again and again as the means of enduring chaotic corruption, Lorgar created the Ecclesiarchy - The Church of the Protector Emperor. This faith was different to many cults that arose before, yet it spread like wildfire, reshaping the belief of the masses. Under careful guidance, religious symbolism of hounds and wolves replaced angels, now associated with traitors, and the knightly depictions of primarchs and their sons grew darker, referencing the grim warriors of Caliban. And the speeches of priests echoed not with words of grand destiny, but praises to silent endurance against the darkness.
As the Imperium rose from the ashes, Magnus reached out to the limping Interex. He reestablished the ties that had shattered during the Treachery and ensured that the civilization endured. It was his actions that would reinforce the Imperial policy towards minor xenos and human civilizations that would endure.
As the realm of man was reshaped by the primarchs, so was the Sol System. Perturabo built up Luna as the new administrative and religious capital of the Imperium. He used now lost technologies to increase its gravity, though reforging a true atmosphere proved impossible. Thus great domed cities covered the satellite, buried as deep into the tunnels as rose above. Yet, it remained a shade of what Terra once was.
Upon the Throneworld little remains. The Imperial Palace has been reduced to what was once the Inner palace and Sanctum Imperialis, shielded by a glass dome of incomprehensible proportions. Only the greatest noble families, holy lineages, pariah bloodlines cultivated by Sisters of Silence and the lineages of heroes of the siege inhabit these outer layers of the fortress.
Few other hives remain, for only the cities that were already dug into the ground and whose outer layers were easy to repurpose were protected. Still these are hives and thus the population of Terra is still counted in the tens of billions, even if such a number is minor enough to make any scholar knowledgeable in the scale of Old Terra pale. However, such a populace is enough to maintain the tradition of Luciferian blacks, who hold the domed hives against the roaming abominable horrors that Perturabo could never stamp out.
With Terra dying, most of the populace had been moved to other asteroids or planetoids, many of which had been initially turned into bases for voidfleets or production facilities. It is said that after Perturabo was done, Sol itself was surrounded by a billion self-sufficient space stations which could forge material from the energy of the star itself.
Still, even with an Imperium renewed, it would nearly buckle underneath the combined malice of the first of the Black Crusades, the great Waaagh under the creature known as the Beast, the resurgence of the Eldari under the Phoenix Banner of the Asurmen and the dread wars against the Legion of Ouroboros which had refused to die during the Great Crusade.
It is only by the presence of 4 primarchs that Imperium endured. Yet as millenia ground on these demigods left the Imperium and fell into myth, while the enemies they barely held back refused to perish.
Within the Eye of Terror, the sons of Lion still plot, still scheme and still prepare. Believing that their failure came from associating with forces that did not understand the true reasons for the great Treachery, the Dark Angels continue their long war mostly alone, yet are more dangerous for it still, as against all odds they maintain their cohesion and will of true astartes.
Not that any of the forces present in the Eye wish to associate much with the traitor sons of Caliban.
The White Scars care little for their long war, preferring to ride free across both Warp and Realspace, seeking strange vistas, absurd speeds and indulgence in stolen riches, pleasing Slaneesh even if they themselves care little for the god that has taken their souls. Night Lords, on the other hand, plot their own revolutions, merely using the Eye as a safer shore when their wars of "liberation" fail, much to the amusement of their patron - Tzeentch.
While Salamanders also seek to break out of the Eye, their war is fully their own. Their mummified chests filled with aching hearts, these warriors of Nurgle fill worlds with dust and rotting bone to numb themselves to the realization that they are nothing less than monsters.
Similarly seemingly little caring of long term goals are the Death Guard. For the sons of Mortarion believe that every single force in the galaxy are witch lovers. Thus every creature butchered is a victory for them, as they honor the blood soaked witch hunter that is their patron - Khorne.
Distant from such pointless "wars" are the sons of Ferrus Manus, for they see the other Legions of the Eye as fools. Together with the priests of the Demonforges they prepare for great campaigns, dragging madness from the deep warp and forging it into flesh of steel. Grand wars do they wage when they march, for they fight to seize territory, resources and facilities, rather than merely butcher. And deeper is their madness than that of their kin as they surge towards seizing a dominion within the center of the galaxy.
An ambition of similar grandness is only held by the Sons of the Phoenix. For upon his Crone Worlds and across the webway Fulgrim builds his xenophile Empire. The Phoenician rules with his Commorite Queen, covering himself in old glories of both mankind and alien to mask his shame as his ambitions grow ever more unhinged.
Though no less dangerous are the Legions trapped within their own warpstorms.
Within the Inwit cluster, Imperator Rogal Dorn and his sons seem to have built a twisted imitation of the Empire of Man. Their worlds are covered with golden fortresses, great monuments to Slaneesh where the Soul Drinkers partake in pleasure of the greatest of luxuries and subject themselves to the worst of pains. Countless times have they tried to break out, to expand their domain, only to be undone by their own masochism.
In the depths of Forsarr Sector, the Raven Guard lurk. Their souls pledged to Nurgle, the ravens are lost to despair, believing themselves to be besieged by the universe. Perhaps enjoying this dread, Nurgle has gifted the sons of Corax with the nightmarish osseonic diseases that enhance these superhumans further. Only this despair, combined with the orkoid and tyrannic infestation of the Forsarr sector has spared the Imperium from the march of a million million spawn marines and the advance of armored columns that could cover worlds in bone devoured steel.
While the Crimson Shroud covering Baal is the smallest among storms, the Knights of Blood are no less dangerous. Each is a vampiric champion of Khorne capable of carving through a dozen opponents with ease. Countless times their blood crusades broke through the Iron cage, slaying thousands of heroes of the Imperium, raising them as bloodless revenants. Mercifully, however, Knights of Blood are often unwilling to "sully" their fangs with ichor of the weak, even aiming their blades against beasts that stand grander than the brutalized defenders of the Imperium.
While other warpstorms raged, spewing out traitors and demons, the Ruinstorm laid silent for millenia, leading some to believe that Ultramarines had perished. Yet, such was not the case, as Ultramar had to endure against enemies from within. For when Roboute Guilliman took the realm truly for himself, he "collapsed" its history into a single point, raising countless empires from non-existence. For millennia the Lord of the 13th waged endless war just to maintain this domain. And now as their armies lay battered and worlds subjugated, his will turns outwards.
Of the Alpha Legion little is known. Their operatives have been seen in the Eye of Terror and the Maelstrom, their companies waging war next to Knights of Blood and Ultramarines, as if Alpharius-Omegon can somehow make pathways between such warp phenomena.
Even outside the warp, the Imperium faces countless foes. Refusing to give up their right to the galaxy, the Eldar of Phoenix Empire wage wars on apocalyptic scale. Led by the immortal Phoenix Lords, the imperial armies of vatborn soldiers fight on a dozen fronts under the delusion that their dead race could reclaim the galaxy.
From the depths of the webway, the degenerate old Drukhari nobility and upstart cabals plague the Imperium, raiding, pillaging and dooming billions to die to feed their void of souls.
Orks, far degenerated from the days of Ullanor, are still a great infection, now approaching critical mass yet again as generations of great warlords rise to destroy the galaxy.
Like a deep rot, the numbers and breeds of xenotic beasts have only increased with time.
The Tau Empire, born from lost visions of an impossible future and seemingly risen overnight, threatens the eastern fringe of the Imperium. Across the galaxy, entire Necron dynasties awaken, cursed by dreams of civilization rebuilt or driven to madness by long sleep. From the great void, the tyranids turn their eyes to the galaxy, their hunger driving them towards one goal - to devour.
In the dark corners of the galaxy stranger and stranger monsters are somehow still seen.
It has been ten millennia since the Leonine Treachery and final hours seem to be drawing nearer.
Across the Imperium, the great machines built by primarchs to create matter from perpetual motion or from hearts of stars are failing, their perfect calibration finally losing sync and denying the Emperor's armies necessary weapons. Integral worlds are lost to enemies too numerous and cruel to be contained, breaking the perfect grid of defense forged by the Lord of Iron. And upon astartes homeworlds, apothecaries are noticing an increase in geneseed failures as the proud brotherhoods of space marines shrink into insignificence.
Around the great warpstorms, the Iron Cages are approaching their limit, for traitors only seem to grow in strength as time goes on. A thousand thousand psykers cry out in horror across the Imperium daily, claiming that powerful warlords are uniting the Legions into great traitor armies and that traitor primarchs are turning their eyes outwards.
In the dark corners of the galaxy, xenos grow braver and viler by the day, sinking their claws into human worlds. Little territory can be given up for time by now, for the Imperium has shrunk in size a dozen dozen times and has approached the limit of what it can give up.
The servants of the Emperor have repelled countless black crusades and held back xeno advancements during the millenia. Yet the situation has grown shockingly grim.
It is the 41st millennium and the only choices arrayed for mankind are madness or extinction.