The Leonine Heresy

by Sharrowkyn

Inspired by the Roboutian Heresy, this is the tale of Lion El'Jonson's fall to Chaos as he leads half of his brothers (and not necessarily the ones you might think) in rebellion against the Emperor. All Index Astartes entries have been completed, and now we are journeying through the various War Zones of the 41st Millennium.

4. Index Astartes: Salamanders

Chapter 4: Index Astartes: Salamanders

Inspired by the Roboutian Heresy, by Zahariel

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Index Astartes- Salamanders: Defenders of Terra

The Praetorian's Legion, the mighty Salamanders maintain their endless watch over Terra. They are paragons of strength and humility, and have protected the Throneworld and its citizens for ten thousand years. Of the many legions created by the Emperor, none are as close to the citizens of the Imperium as the redoubtable Eighteenth Legion, who keep watch from their many fortresses scattered throughout Terra and the Solar System. Master artisans, they are as adept at creating technological wonders as they are at prosecuting a conflict. Though their father has long since disappeared, they maintain hope in his return one day as they selflessly continue their long vigil.

Origins: Forged in Fire

Long ago, in the mists of history, the Emperor created twenty sons to aid him as he prepared to embark upon the Great Crusade. However, there were those jealous of him, and through an act of treachery, stole his sons, casting them to the stars in an attempt to keep them from him. Refusing to let his designs be halted, the Emperor continued without them, completing the unification of Terra and launching his noble quest to reclaim Humanity's birthright. At his side on his journey through the stars were the mighty Legiones Astartes, gene-forged super-warriors whose might in battle was unmatched. These 'space marines', as the Astartes were commonly known, were masters of every form of war, knew no fear, and were unparalleled in battle. Many worlds simply surrendered when it was known what they would be facing. Yet it would be incorrect to state that all Astartes were the same. Though it is true that most legions remained generalists with slight specialization, there were some that seemed set apart from the others from the onset, and one of these was Legion XVIII.

Originally known as the 'Dragon Warriors', the Astartes of the Eighteenth Legion were recruited from Terra like the other legions. It is believed the bulk of their recruits came from the clans that lived in the rugged terrain of Abyssna, the techno-barbarian enclave situated between the hive cities of the Indoi and the plains of the Midafric. The people of these clans welcomed the Emperor, and eagerly accepted unification in exchange for freedom from the harsh conditions where they were forced to mine the precious metals situated below the volcanic ranges of their homeland. In gratitude, they offered up their sons to their liberator, who inducted them into his service. Such a harsh life left an indelible effect on the recruits' psyche, and the culture of the Eighteenth rapidly became one of resilience and determination. The Dragon Warriors became known for their strength and toughness, unyielding in the face of danger to an almost suicidal degree. When the Eighteenth was told to hold a point, they would hold that point, weathering whatever was thrown at them no matter the casualties.

As can be imagined, such a mindset had a negative effect on the legion's size, and the legion was in danger of disappearing several times due to overwhelming casualties. The closest the legion came to extinction came after their famous Assault on the Tempest Galleries. The XVIII Legion was sent to secure one of the last techno-barbarian holdouts, located within the Caucasus Wastes. Though few in number, the twisted eugenicist-oligarchs had access to rare and powerful technologies, which they used to create a variety of monstrous warriors in imitation of the Emperor's soldiers. They ruled from vast mountain fortresses, hollowed out and filled with laboratories where they crafted their horrific minions. The Emperor himself led a direct assault, backed by the might of six legions. Meanwhile, the XVIII Legion struck at the fortresses from below in what was deemed a suicide mission to infiltrate the fortresses and destroy their shield generators. Located deep within Terra's mantle, the geothermal furnaces drew power from the vast lava chambers, and were thought to be impregnable due to their location and defenses. The Dragon Warriors legion as a whole were committed to this action, some 20,000 strong.

Utilizing experimental drilling machines recently acquired from Mars, the legionaries saluted their Emperor, and embarked on their journey, swiftly losing all communication as they traveled deep below the earth. Weeks passed, and as the Emperor maintained the siege on the surface, many urged him to give up the legion as lost. The Emperor however silenced these critics, and spoke of his faith in the legion to pass through any fire, to complete this or any task. As he finished speaking, a vast earthquake shook the region, and the Emperor's host cheered as the shield domes of the fortress gave out. When the battle had ended and the fortress was taken, barely a thousand remained from the Eighteenth Legion. The commanders of the XVIII reported before the Emperor, telling of a molten underworld which existed below the surface, filled with vile abominable intelligences and other horrors of Old Night. The Dragon Warriors had fought their way through, destroying these monsters that they may never see the light of day. The Emperor lauded these warriors of the XVIII, and bestowed their first battle honor on them.

Little is known of the knowledge recovered at such dear price from the Tempest Galleries. Though honored, the XVIII was withdrawn from independent campaigning as they rebuilt their numbers. They were used as an elite supplement, dispatched in small numbers no bigger than a chapter to support the other legions as they conquered the stars. The legion began to develop its own culture: having descended through fire and darkness, there was nowhere to go but up. The legion became renowned for their skill in metallurgy, and it is believed they spent their time working with the scientists of the Emperor, perfecting the archaic technologies they had recovered to new use in service of the Great Crusade. So the Dragon Warriors spent the better part of three decades, living among the people of Terra in between deployments, until the day their primarch returned.

The Wanderer

Cast into the tides of the Immaterium, the little pods bearing the Emperor's handiwork were deposited onto worlds across the galaxy. There the primarchs would be shaped by their upbringing, molding each into independent and disparate individuals whose views were often radically different than those of their brothers or father. So it was with the inhabitant of Pod XVIII, which came to rest on the feudal death-world of Nocturne. A vision of the Catheric hells, Nocturne is a world covered in volcanic activity and ash desert wastes. Little grows there, for the sky is almost always covered in sulfurous fumes, and little can be built there, for the entire planet is constantly wracked by tectonic forces. Rivers of lava flow like water, and monsters lurk in the volcanoes, while the small population labors in feudal conditions in the few cities on the planet, built in the shadows of dormant volcanoes. It was in the greatest of these, Hesiod, (though only a small village by Imperial standards) that the pod landed, crashing from the sky like a fiery comet.

As the wary people of Hesiod gathered around the smoking wreckage, they were astounded to find a small boy inside, seemingly unharmed. The village people took him in, and gave the young man the name 'Vulkan'. Like all primarchs, he swiftly grew, and reached adulthood by the age of three, towering over his adopted people. Nocturne was a planet of intense radiation, and the boy's skin soon matched those around him, darkening to become as black as coal, while his eyes began to glow red. He learned from all around him, learning the tenets of the Promethean Cult, the collection of traditions that bound all who lived upon Nocturne. However, he felt there was more to life than this, as though he had been created for a higher purpose than just serving as an apprentice to a blacksmith. Vulkan had an innate sense of joy and wonder, and easily bonded with all that he met. His childhood was peaceful as could be hoped on a death world, and Vulkan brought his strength to bear in hunting the deadly megafauna of Nocturne such as the deadly salamanders, massive reptilians hunted for their meat and hides.

Overall it was a quiet life, though it was not to remain, for in his fourth year, Hesiod was attacked. The legends of Nocturne spoke of monsters known as the dusk wraiths, who appeared from nowhere to steal children and murder any in their paths. Their depredations were known across the planet, and they seemed invincible, the arrows and swords of the tribes unable to hurt the invaders who seemed to take savage joy in inspiring fear. As Vulkan worked in his forge, the town bells began to ring out, signaling the return of these Dusk Wraiths. The townspeople begged him to join them in fleeing, hiding from the monsters who had returned once more. But Vulkan was stubborn, and would not budge as he stood hammering at his work, waiting to view these Wraiths with his own eyes.

As the alien skimmers screamed over the buildings, the capering forms of the Wraiths emerged, murdering and maiming with sadistic pleasure. Comparing these raiders with similar reports, Imperial scholars believe these 'Wraiths' are none other than the Drukhari, a debased offshoot of the Aeldari. Picking up his hammer, Vulkan crushed the xenos foolish enough to cross his path. He walked through the town, the enemy's shots merely bouncing off his skin as he chased the interlopers, taking revenge for the murdered villagers. The Wraiths had brought only small arms designed to inflict pain rather than kill, and so they lacked any weapon capable of seriously harming him. The cowardly xenos, realizing they could not win, began to flee, returning to their ships and retreating to the ash deserts from whence they came. Vulkan was furious that these things had murdered his friends, and so he chased them, running faster than his massive frame had any right to.

He followed them into the trackless deserts, killing the stragglers unlucky enough to fall behind. Though the people of Nocturne did not know it, the Wraiths were not native to their world, and as Vulkan came upon their camp, he witnessed their transports going through a large archway before disappearing. While the manner by which they escaped was unknown to Vulkan, he realized that he would need to follow them, to stop them from ever returning to hurt his friends. Vulkan rushed through the camp, crushing beneath his mighty hammer the fragile Wraiths. As he stood alone in the camp, surrounded by the corpses of the foe, he found himself drawn to the skimmers now idling nearby. Despite its alien construction, he began to work the controls of the ship as if by instinct, and the ship lurched forward, and entered into the Gate. As the primarch disappeared from Nocturne, the few psychically gifted on that world felt a ripple in the Immaterium, both rage and confusion in equal measure, as if something unforeseen had just occurred.

The small raiding craft shot forward through the tunnels of the Webway, its sole occupant confused but without fear. It exited through another gate into what must have looked like a nightmare. Baleful, sickly light emanated from a multitude of false suns while colossal towers loomed overhead, jutting from every angle. The primarch felt a thousand eyes turn as one towards his small craft, and he had barely a second to leap from it to a tower below him as the small transport ceased to be, struck from every angle by beams of dark light. Vulkan had little time to react, as more wraiths rushed at him clawing at him in a frenzy. He crushed them as he ran, charging through the seemingly endless corridors of the tower before emerging in a shanty-town. Eventually he outdistanced his pursuers, who gave up and returned to seek easier prey. However, he was now hopelessly lost in a realm utterly inimical to humanity.

The Webway

The Aeldari do not travel through the Warp as Mankind does. Instead, they utilize a mysterious network of tunnels through another dimension known as the "Webway". Very little is known of how it works, for the Aeldari guard its secrets jealously. Nevertheless, the Inquisition has managed to piece together a basic idea of how it works. The Webway seems to sit between our reality and the Warp, and through the use of what are known as Webway Gates, one can enter into a series of tunnels, and emerge through another Gate on the other side of the galaxy, without ever having entered the Warp. These tunnels vary in size, from small strings that allow only foot travel, to massive branches that allow entire starships to transit through. In the middle of these routes lay nodes, widenings in the Webway where entire cities can be constructed, unbound to the laws of physics that exist in realspace.

As the Aeldari Empire reached new lows of debauchery and decadence, many of its citizens began to sense something stirring in the Immaterium, an echo which grew louder as time passed. Most paid little attention to such echoes, lost in their revels, but others heeded the call, and began to depart the Aeldari Empire. Some fled to remote worlds, cutting themselves off from technology, while others retreated to massive starships known as Craftworlds. However, the vast majority of those fleeing (though this was but a drop in the ocean that was the Aeldari population) left realspace altogether, going to live in the Webway Cities. It is unknown how many cities there are or how many live there, but such realms are not safe for Mankind. The Aeldari kill any intruders they find, and the Webway itself is dangerous, for branches can collapse without warning, crushing those unfortunate enough to be trapped inside or allowing the infinite energies of the Warp to seep in.

Nocturne was not exactly a beacon of science and knowledge, and therefore Vulkan had no idea where he was or how he got there. His instincts told him that these wraiths were not to be trusted, and so he took to the shadows, observing those around him. Though he did not know it, Vulkan had emerged inside the greatest of all Webway City Nodes, the Port of Commorragh. Port Commorragh of M30 was very different compared to the Dark City that now exists in M41. This Commorragh was more akin to a naval yard than a city, a ruthlessly efficient hub designed to handle traveling Aeldari fleets. The entire city was controlled by the Aeldari nobility, who remained in their vast fortresses looking down upon the masses of slaves of every race who toiled for their amusement. Vulkan knew he had to gain knowledge, and so he slipped in among the slaves, gaining wisdom while learning all manner of technological secrets stolen from the neglectful Aeldari. Some of his time was spent as a slave, other times as a bodyguard to Aeldari nobles, watching and waiting, searching for other humans, as well as an escape route that would lead him back home.

Decades passed, and although he had found several unlikely comrades, xenos that he could say he trusted, Vulkan despaired of ever finding an escape. His time spent in the Webway had changed him: the easy-going joy had been replaced with a stern, unforgiving nature, a man willing to do whatever it took to survive in this hell. Many times Vulkan awoke alone, unsure of how he had survived without a mark on him, and his comrades were shocked to see him return to them, alive and unharmed time after time with no memory of these assaults. Fate finally smiled upon Vulkan, and he found the knowledge he was seeking: a way back to a human planet, the way back to his own kind.

Vulkan lifted his hammer, wiping the gore on the corpse of the alien who told him what he needed to know. Though he knew they called themselves Aeldari, still he thought of them as wraiths, the monsters who had preyed on his home so long ago. He turned to his comrade, the only wraith he could honestly say he could trust, and bid him farewell. The Wraith gave him a cruel smile, and watched Vulkan head towards the warehouse district the informant had told him of. The Wraith headed back towards the Port proper with his band of allies, a group of black-hearted rogues Vulkan had jokingly referred to as his cabal. Commorragh would bow to him one day, no matter how long it took. So swore Vect, First of the Eladrith Ynneas.

As Vulkan entered the warehouses, he saw an armored figure standing in front of his goal. Vulkan rushed him, for nothing would stand between him and freedom. To his surprise, the figure simply retreated through the portal, and despite entering barely a second later, the figure was nowhere to be seen in the empty white tunnel. Though this was but his second time in the Webway, the path Vulkan was in was entirely straightforward, and so he followed the path for what seemed like days, his armor sealed to protect him from any danger. He had crafted it himself from scraps found throughout the Port, and it was the equal of any Aeldari noble's. Finally, he emerged through the other side of the gate. He stood in a vast crater, the land around him as lifeless as the Webway had been. Overhead, a planet orbited silently in the void while the gate he had come through disappeared, retracting back into the ground. As Vulkan began to climb out of the crater, a golden light began to shine all around him, and he emerged to see a lone figure in front of him, radiating pure auric light so unlike the sickly false light prevalent in the Port and the Webway. The man smiled, and stretched out his arms in welcome, and spoke. "Welcome home, my son."

Though Vulkan did not know it, as fate would have it, the Webway tunnel had taken him not back to Nocturne as he had hoped, but rather to Luna. The Emperor sensed the presence of his son so close to Terra, and came immediately. Vulkan did not know what to make of this stranger, for things were rarely what they seemed in the Webway, but agreed to return with him back to Terra. The Emperor took him back to the Palace, and spent days with his son, learning all that had befallen Vulkan since he had been taken away. Time passes differently in the Webway, and although Vulkan reckoned himself to be over a hundred years old, barely a third of that had passed in the real world. Perhaps if Vulkan had not gone through that gate, their reunion would have been different, more joyous. But Vulkan had changed in his wanderings, and though he believed this man was his father, Vulkan could not bring himself to open himself up fully to the Emperor. Nor did it seem the Emperor was fully open to him: the man calling himself Vulkan's father seemed saddened that Vulkan was rather cold towards him.

Nonetheless, Vulkan agreed to serve his father, and he was brought to the Imperial Forges under the Ural Mountains, where he met his brother Ferrus Manus, who had been discovered nearly ten years before him. The reunion between Ferrus and Vulkan stood in stark contrast to the one between Vulkan and the Emperor, and the two got along immediately. Both could see the raw strength in the other, and swiftly became close friends. Ferrus respected Vulkan for his endurance, while Vulkan appreciated Ferrus's honesty, a rare trait in Commorragh and one that Vulkan found refreshing. The two spent weeks together, competing against each other in brotherly contests to create wonders of technology and artifice, as well as crafting a suit of power armor befitting a primarch. He seemed to have an innate grasp of technology, and a mastery of creation that complemented Ferrus's mastery of destruction. Together they crafted a mighty weapon known as Dawnbringer, a massive hammer with a built-in teleporter, which became Vulkan's signature weapon in the years to come.

After his time with Ferrus, the Emperor took Vulkan with him to be trained in warfare. Like all primarchs, Vulkan proved to be a swift learner, effortlessly mastering the complexities of interstellar warfare. He fought at the Emperor's side as a nameless giant in his green, scaled power armor, and rumors abounded of the Emperor's new champion. To his disappointment, it seemed as though Vulkan would not be able to return to Nocturne yet, for the galaxy was a vast place and the Great Crusade had yet to unite the stars under the Imperial Aquila. After several years, the time came for Vulkan to rejoin his sons.

While Vulkan was fighting alongside his father, the Dragon Warriors had continued to campaign, responding to the call of a nearby world under invasion by Orks. The barbaric greenskins had multiple space hulks, each swarming with millions of orks, and were taking their time butchering the helpless world of Antaem. By the time the Dragon Warriors arrived under Legion Master Cassian Vaughn, Antaem was lifeless save for the teeming masses of orks. Determined to avenge the fallen, Vaughn had ordered the Legion to assault the greenskins, tearing through their ramshackle fleet with a vengeance. However, the orks vastly outnumbered the legionaries, and attrition began to take its toll. The legion grew close to destruction as the orks boarded the few Legion ships, and Vaughn prepared a valiant last stand, preparing to detonate their engines so as to take the foe with them.

As the Dragon Warriors fought to hold off the boarders long enough to give Vaughn the time he needed, they received a signal from reinforcements. A new fleet of Eighteenth Legion ships entered the battle, each bristling with unique weaponry that shattered the space hulks, while thousands of Astartes in the livery of the Eighteenth entered the battle, recruits from Terra led by Vulkan himself. The orks were routed, and a great victory was achieved, though Legion Master Vaughn was mortally wounded during the battle. Touched by their selfless sacrifice, Vulkan spoke to his legion on the plains of Antaem, and renamed the legion. Thus the Dragon Warriors became the Salamanders, the soldiers who would pass through any flame and become stronger for it.

The Great Crusade: A Legion Reforged

The Salamanders took to the stars with a renewed sense of determination and drive, conquering by their father's side at the forefront of the Great Crusade. Their reckless tenacity had been tempered by the trials they had gone through, and so they turned it towards better ends, retaking hundreds of systems with the support of the 154th Expeditionary Fleet. Vulkan's time in the Webway had left him with a powerful desire to protect humanity, a legacy of witnessing Aeldari cruelty to their human slaves over the course of decades. Their humanitarian actions won them the admiration and loyalty of many systems, who eagerly offered their sons to join the legion or to fight alongside them as part of the Imperial Army. Thus despite their low numbers to begin with, the Salamanders were able to keep up an impressive rate of compliances with the support of their many Army auxiliaries. Their many victories were especially well-recorded as the Salamanders were one of the few legions who supported the work of the Remembrancer Order, allowing them access to their campaigns and thus garnered an almost unmatched reputation for heroism.

The Eighteenth also fought alongside and were well-liked by many of their fellow Astartes, and were believed to have the most ties among the legions. Vulkan himself got along well with his brothers, his stern nature tempered by a hidden soft side that occasionally showed through. He was closest with Ferrus Manus, and remained close with most of his brothers save for a few. He never got along with his older brother Jaghatai of Chemos, the primarch found right before him, due to his aloof nature, nor did he get along with Konrad Curze, found nearly a century after him, whose cruelties were an uncomfortable reminder of his time in Port Commorragh. This relationship was to change, however, after the events of Imperial Compliance 154-6, the Kharataan Campaign.

Due to his time in the Webway, Vulkan developed a strong hatred for Aeldari of any sort. All Astartes bear a strong hatred towards xenos, and thus the Salamanders became known for their campaigns against the Aeldari and their willingness to join campaigns against them. Many Exodite Worlds suffered their wrath, and even several craftworlds were attacked, the vast world-ships boarded and captured before being redirected into nearby suns. The fury of the Salamanders was even hotter when faced with human worlds that had been subverted by Aeldari. Of particular note was the Compliance of 154-4. Known as Ibsen by its inhabitants, the Salamanders discovered a world openly ruled by a coven of Aeldari, who claimed to have liberated the world from others of their kind. Vulkan refused to believe such lies, and landed in force, crushing the alien forces as well as the natives of the world, who rose up to defend the Aeldari. His fury was further stoked by the discovery of Webway gates on the planet, and he ordered the entire population cleansed with flame, eradicating all sentient life on the planet. Leaving the planet to be settled by new waves of colonists, the Salamanders moved on to new conquests. To their surprise, they were met by the Emperor himself at the head of the vast 1st Expeditionary Fleet.

As the docking clamps locked onto the small shuttle and the transport's doors opened, Vulkan stepped out into the hangar of the Bucephalus, the vast golden instrument of death that served as the flagship of the Emperor himself. Standing in their rows like so many regal statues were the ranks of the Custodes, the Emperor's bodyguards, their spears at the ready. At their head stood the Emperor himself. Vulkan saw his father as he always did: a powerful figure, radiating sheer majesty yet somehow softened by humanity. He sank to one knee, his gauntleted fists raised in the sign of the Aquila.

"Father."

"Vulkan, my son. Rise." Doing as the Emperor bid, Vulkan stood up, tearing his eyes from his father's radiance with some difficulty. With surprise, he noted the figure standing by the Emperor's side.

"What is he doing here? I heard he had been removed from the Crusade years ago for his actions." The figure gave no reaction to Vulkan's comment, his blindfold covering those sunken black eyes that used to make Vulkan so uneasy.

"Be at ease, Vulkan. Konrad has come to join you in the crusade." Konrad Curze gave his brother a smile, and spoke for the first time, though his words were unheard by Vulkan, who stared in disbelief.

When the Primarch of the Night Lords was first found on the world of Nostramo in the far-off reaches of the Eastern Fringe, he swiftly created a reputation as dark as his homeworld. Konrad Curze became known as a figure of terror, brutalizing populations as he led the Eighth Legion in the Great Crusade. After several years of increasingly violent compliances, as well as rumored attacks on his brothers, the Emperor finally stepped in, and forcibly took the Night Haunter, as Curze called himself, back to Terra, and the Night Lords were subordinated to the Luna Wolves. Years passed, and none knew what had happened to the Primarch, though here he was now. His skin, once pale and wasted, now bore a healthier color; the smile on his face looked genuine, not at all like the death's head grin he was known for. Most striking was the white blindfold which covered his eyes, which stood at odds with the ease with which he moved, as if he could still see despite that.

The Emperor told Vulkan that Curze was to take part in the Crusade once more, and would be fighting at Vulkan's side while the Night Lords finished their current campaigns elsewhere. Swallowing his pride, Vulkan accepted his father's command, and returned with Konrad to his ship, knowing better than to ask what had happened to Konrad during his exile or why he had been chosen to watch over his brother. The two began prosecuting the Crusade again, and though Vulkan initially distrusted his brother, it seemed as though Konrad was an entirely different person. Gone was the corpse grin and mocking laughter, replaced with a serious, more relaxed demeanor that Vulkan found himself liking despite his best efforts to remain aloof.

Several years passed, and the time came for Konrad to return to his own legion. In that time a genuine bond had been formed between Vulkan and Konrad, united in their dedication to the Emperor and a desire to protect humanity. The fleets of the Luna Wolves and Salamanders united, and Konrad departed with his legion. Horus took the time to introduce Vulkan to their brother Corvus Corax, who had been campaigning with him. Vulkan knew little of this brother, who had been reunited with their father nearly a century after Vulkan had, but Horus assured him they would get along. Thus Vulkan resumed campaigning, uniting the Salamanders with the Raven Guard, and the two legions meshed well. The forces of Ferrus Manus joined them also, and together the three proved a formidable force, bringing many worlds into compliance and forging bonds of unity among the three legions. They grew famous for their combined arms tactics, the elite strike teams of the Raven Guard opening up opportunities for the heavy weapons of the Iron Hands to break down the defenses of any foe as they drove them onto the crushing force of the Salamanders anvil. The three brothers were not present at Ullanor, though they duly sent their representatives to march in the Grand Triumph, and paid their fealty to Horus as Warmaster, Vulkan soothing Ferrus's temper at being passed over.

Later on, Vulkan left his brothers to campaign on his own once more. However, as he waited for his sons to muster to his side, word came that the Emperor had called a gathering regarding the question of psykers among the legions that was to occur on the nearby world of Nikaea. Neither Ferrus nor Corax cared overmuch on the question of the Librarius, and they continued to finish up their own campaigns while Vulkan traveled to hear the Council's verdict. Psykers were present in the Salamanders legion, but they were never very prominent or held much influence. Thus Vulkan was not overly concerned over which decision the council might take, and so he kept his silence as his other brothers debated. When the decision came to ban the Librarius, he duly disbanded them back into the legion proper. He mostly felt pity for the censured Magnus, wondering if this was how Lorgar or Konrad felt when they were forced to return to Terra. However, what happened next truly shook Vulkan. When the position of Praetorian was announced, Vulkan believed such an honor would fall to either the Fourth or Seventh Legion, but to his surprise, the Emperor pronounced his choice was to be Vulkan. As he stood there numb, acclaimed by many of his brothers, he could sense the glaring hatred of his brothers Dorn and Perturabo. Later on, in the days after the council, Ferrus and Corax arrived, and congratulated Vulkan on his new title. Though he was saddened to be leaving these brothers, he looked forward to his time on Terra and getting to be around the Emperor more often. He returned to his ships, and they departed towards Terra with the entirety of his legion.

Praetorian of Terra

After arriving on Terra, Vulkan found himself largely left to his own devices. Vulkan tried to approach his father, to ask him why he had been chosen, but was unable to gain an audience, for the Emperor was busy dealing with his brother Magnus. Unable to meet with the Emperor, Vulkan passed the years with Malcador the Sigillite, who advised Vulkan much as he had the Emperor. Together the two began molding Terra into the seat of governance for the burgeoning Imperium. Vulkan and Malcador created the Council of Terra, and oversaw the importation of resources on a vast scale. Terra existed in a perpetual state of starvation and gridlock, overwhelmed by the vast fleets constantly coming into the system. To address this, they crafted the Administratum, a governmental entity which would be able to handle the logistics on such a grand scale. Tithes began flowing in from across the galaxy, the wealth of conquered worlds turned towards building Terra back up after the ravages of the Age of Strife. The resources of the galaxy were used to build up the Imperial Palace into a work of art, and the soaring Himalazians themselves were hollowed, its ore and stone used to craft the walls of the Palace to soaring heights.

Assisting the construction effort of the Salamanders was a force from another legion, the Thousand Sons. While Magnus was under close watch by the Emperor, the rest of his legion had been split up, reassigned to support duty for the other legions. Warmaster Horus had handled the logistics of the split, and had assigned a fellowship of the Fifteenth Legion to the Salamanders. Horus knew Vulkan had a neutral stance, and personally asked Vulkan to temporarily watch over some of Magnus's sons, and Vulkan had agreed. Vulkan was unsure what to do with these legionaries, and left them to their own devices, allowing them to help in construction or remain in their barracks as they pleased. All the while, the Thousand Sons were watched by the chaplains of the Word Bearers. Vulkan never had much interaction with Lorgar, either before or after the Emperor's intervention, though he was uncomfortable with the thought of worshiping his father. Nevertheless, he welcomed the Sons of Colchis into his legion's ranks, giving them the access they required to ensure the Salamanders were complying with the Edict of Nikaea.

As the Great Crusade had progressed, Vulkan had made it one of his primary tasks to find his long-lost homeworld, to return his legion to Nocturne that they might learn as he did. However, such a task was like finding a needle in an infinite haystack, and Nocturne seemed destined to stay lost, as Vulkan was now bound to Terra. The Salamanders began to transition from being fleet-based, and erected a vast fortress on the world of Venus, the sister planet of Terra. Such a death world, with its many volcanoes, would prove to be a suitable place to train the new legionaries, and was as close to Nocturne as could be achieved. He named the fortress-monastery Prometheus, after the moon of Nocturne, and spent much time there, walking among the initiates and passing on to them what little knowledge of the Promethean Creed he could in the time he spent there. The bulk of the legion however stayed on Terra, and lived among its people, crafting works of wonder in many hives as they worked to bond with its people. The Eighteenth remained gathered within the Solar System, the only exception being the chapter of warriors led by Captain Rahz Obek who had joined the Warmaster's Legion Auxilia. Due to the sheer amount of work present on Terra, the Salamanders never really accepted the warrior lodges that propagated among other legions.

After several years of being ignored, Vulkan could stand it no longer, and descended into the depths of the Imperial Palace, attempting to use his authority as Praetorian to push his way past the Custodians to see the Emperor. After a tense standoff, Malcador intervened, and took Vulkan to see his father. They walked for miles, through the vast labyrinth that comprised the depths of the Inner Palace. Vulkan had not spent much time here, for it had already existed prior to his arrival, and had concentrated his efforts on building up the outer wings of the palace. Thus he followed Malcador, past the bones of long-dead settlements, past the statues of forgotten gods and vast machines whose true purpose remained unknown, even to Vulkan. They walked through massive caverns filled with Mechanicus laborers and silent Custodian watchers, and through the massive Eternity Gate itself, flanked by two towering titans which remained still. There Vulkan and Malcador beheld a vast pyramidal machine, topped by a golden throne and niches in the walls surrounding it. Far below the summit stood a glowing golden gate, its shape all-too-familiar to Vulkan. Emerging from the gateway was the Emperor himself. Silencing his son's questions, the Emperor spoke to Vulkan about his plans to breach the Webway, to remove Mankind's dependence on the Warp. The rest of their conversation remains known only to Vulkan and the Emperor himself, though whatever was said seems to have reassured Vulkan, who returned to the surface and resumed construction of the Palace. The Emperor remained in the depths of the Palace, and Vulkan did not return down there, nor did he speak of what he had seen until many years later.

After leaving the dungeons, Vulkan returned to his work and continued to build up Terra, his sons bringing structure to the world despite the dwindling resource importation. Though the work continued unabated, the resource fleets which had once filled Terra's skies began to lessen. Communication with outside systems became more difficult, the Navigator Houses speaking of increasing numbers of warp storms throughout the galaxy. He received periodic updates from the various Crusade fleets, as well as grim news from the Warmaster, tales of legions going renegade and not reporting for some time. Vulkan himself remained unsure, and received many conflicting reports from different sectors across the galaxy.

All this changed when a ragged Sons of Horus fleet arrived, bearing the body of their fallen primarch in a stasis coffin. Malcador relayed the news to the Emperor, while Vulkan remained by his brother's side. When the Emperor arrived, they rushed the stasis coffin into the medical wing of the Palace, where the Emperor himself began to heal his fallen son in a process that would take days. Vulkan returned to the surface, handling the logistics of the fleet's arrival. Suddenly, he felt a tug at his mind, and he heard the voice of Malcador, urging him to go beneath the Palace to the Imperial Dungeons. Vulkan could tell by the urgency in his voice that a disaster had happened, that something vital had been lost. As he rushed through the labyrinthine corridors of the Inner Palace, he ran into his brother Magnus, who had been hurtling in the opposite direction. Vulkan tried to speak with him, for this was the first time he had come face to face with his brother in years.

"Magnus? What are you doing? What's going on?" Vulkan demanded. His brother stared at him blankly before his brow furrowed, his mouth set in grim determination.

As Vulkan began to ask again, he heard the shouts of Custodians behind him, and Magnus stretched out his hand, invisible psychic force throwing Vulkan into the nearest wall as he continued to run. Vulkan was caught completely by surprise by this hostile action, though his resilience allowed him to survive being thrown with such force. Magnus wasted no time, swiftly running towards the outer palace. Whatever had happened, Magnus was clearly desperate to get away.

Vulkan jumped to his feet, and gave chase, utilizing Dawnbringer's teleporter to shunt himself in front of Magnus. As he rematerialized, he used his momentum to swing the hammer in a mighty arc, intending to knock Magnus off his feet. Such a blow would have been too fast for any mortal to stop, but his brother was a primarch. Magnus caught the hammer mid-swing, bringing it to a dead stop as Vulkan strained to complete the blow.

Magnus took the offensive once more, drawing his curved blade, and the two primarchs began to duel. As the two demigods clashed, actinic flares flashed around them accompanied by a sulfurous stench as the Thousand Sons began to arrive, giving battle as they clashed with the Custodes before they could intervene, their energies warping the rooms around them. These battles were far from Vulkan's mind, however, as he strained to overcome Magnus's defenses. Vulkan had always been the strongest primarch, but Magnus had clearly bolstered himself with sorcery, and his might gave even Vulkan pause. Magnus began to force Vulkan back onto the defensive, expertly wielding the longer reach of his blade and staff to slip past Vulkan's hammer.

Taking a risk, Vulkan batted aside the staff with Dawnbringer, then dropped it, tackling Magnus around the waist. As he began to drive Magnus back, his brother screamed, and Vulkan was thrown back by the sheer fury of Magnus. Vulkan was lifted into the air and yanked forward, as Magnus skewered him through the heart, his curved khopesh blade piercing through his unarmored chest straight through to his spine. Magnus threw him to the side, leaving the blade embedded in him, burning with sorcerous fire.

Vulkan watched, unable to move as Magnus turned his attention to the Custodes, swiftly killing them with bolts of sorcery that doomed whomever they struck. As his eyes dimmed, he watched Magnus and his Sons flee down the hallway. Vulkan had failed to stop him, and his vision faded to black. Vulkan died.

Then Vulkan lived.

As the few Salamanders present gathered around Vulkan's lifeless corpse, distraught and uncertain what to do about the loss of their gene-father, they watched with astonishment as the wounds began to heal before their very eyes. Vulkan climbed to his feet, and his sons erupted in a roar. Vulkan lived, though none knew the cause of his resurrection. Some of the Salamanders claimed it was a miracle, others that the Emperor himself was the cause; the Custodes believed that he wasn't quite dead yet. As Vulkan began to look himself over, he felt as though part of him was missing, as though his emotions were muted, as though something were different. His wonder at living was tempered by the knowledge that he had failed to stop his treacherous brother Magnus. He ordered his sons to keep this a secret, and traveled deeper into the Palace, seeking out Malcador and his father to see what had happened. His route was easy: all he had to do was follow the hundreds of Custodes who were rushing towards the dungeons.

Before he could enter the dungeons proper, Vulkan came across Malcador, and demanded to know what had happened. The Sigillite explained that Magnus and his sons had breached the Webway project, irreparably damaging the delicate mechanisms of the Golden Throne while the Emperor was away. He explained that the defenses of the Golden Throne were failing, and that the Warp was starting to seep into the Webway. Entire sections had been lost, corrupted by the energies of the Warp beginning to weigh down on the tunnels, the entities within trying to breach the wards and enter the gateway to Terra. Vulkan asked how he still lived despite Magnus's assault, and Malcador began to explain that Vulkan, like the Regent himself, possessed a rare gift: he was a Perpetual, an immortal being whom death could not keep. He told Vulkan that this was not the first time he had died, that he had died an unknown number of times during his wanderings through Commorragh. Vulkan swore this was not the case, but Malcador explained each death takes a little bit away while leaving minute psychic scars where the mortal mind had erased the memory of the death in order to stay sane. Malcador made him swear to keep this knowledge secret from all others, and so Vulkan did, though he was uneasy at the implications.

Vulkan's role as Praetorian now assumed a different character, as the Emperor's work now became a dagger in his back, an existential threat buried beneath it. He began to draw resources inward, calling upon all the resources he could muster to support the Emperor's work. The Custodes and the Silent Sisterhood were but finite in number, and would not be able to hold the Webway tunnels without support. It was unknown how Astartes would handle fighting the entities of the Warp, and mortal soldiers could not be trusted. Therefore Vulkan reached out to the Mechanicum of Mars, calling upon their pact to serve the Omnissiah in his Great Work, creating the army known as the Unifiers. Vast numbers of skitarii were marched into the depths of the Palace, mindwiped and designed only for fighting. The dungeons of Mars were emptied, their unfortunate inhabitants converted into battle servitors, while entire knightly houses joined them in the depths of the Webway. Even titans themselves were called, disassembled into millions of pieces and carried on grav-transports to be reassembled inside the Great Work. Vulkan and the Salamanders began to rebuild the inner sanctums into a fortress, designed to keep anything from escaping. Meanwhile the Mechanicus began to reinforce the pathways of the Great Work, the might of the Golden Throne holding the tunnels open while the servants of the Machine Cult rushed to reinforce the cracked foundations.

However, emptying the defenders of Mars proved to be a mistake. Terra began to receive distress calls from Mars, before they were abruptly cut off. The Mechanicus present on Terra proved unable to reestablish communications, and they spoke of a total collapse of the noospheric network there, of scrapcode so damaging that they had to block their receptors lest Terra too be infected. Scanners began to show vast explosions across Mars, and it was as though the planet was at war with itself. Such timing was no coincidence, as Vulkan grimly realized. This must be some sort of attack, whether by the Thousand Sons, who had fled Terra with their father, or by parties unknown. After Mars was deemed lost, Vulkan sent a task force of his sons on a raid upon the planet, seizing vital weapons and armor that his legion would need for any prolonged conflict. With his own forces supplied, Vulkan reached out to the one brother he could trust above all others, Ferrus Manus, calling upon the Iron Tenth to reestablish order on the Red Planet. Ferrus answered the call, and began to move his forces back to Mars. As the Iron Hands blockaded the planet, they came under attack by not only swarms of malfunctioning skitarii, but also Astartes as well. Though Vulkan initially suspected it to be the Thousand Sons, Ferrus told him they were not the Fifteenth Legion but the Thirteenth. It was unknown how the Ultramarines had arrived there or why they were attacking the Iron Hands, but clearly retaking Mars would be more difficult than suspected. Malcador ordered knowledge of the Ultramarines' treachery hidden until they could be captured and interrogated, but no son of Guilliman was ever taken alive, for they fought like madmen.

Vulkan thus began to fortify the outer walls of the Palace as well, for this was clearly treachery by more than just a few legions. It was unknown who could be trusted, and so Vulkan began to work with the assumption that most of the legions had gone renegade besides his own and the Iron Hands. Mars was cordoned off, blockaded by the forces of Ferrus Manus, and Vulkan began to fortify the entirety of the Solar System in case of attack. He dispatched the might of his legion to positions across Terra, and they began turning the many hive cities into veritable fortresses, filling them with garrisons and defensive weaponry. The rest of the planets were fortified likewise: the forges of Mars under Imperial control were put to work constructing vast quantities of munitions, and orbital plates were converted to vast gun platforms. All the while, the War in the Webway continued to rage, siphoning away vital resources as Vulkan attempted to defend from both within and without.

Thus when a ragged fleet bearing the markings of the multiple legions arrived years later, they were treated with suspicion, their ships boarded and searched by wary parties of Eighteenth Legionaries. Vulkan learned this ragtag fleet had both Horus and Mortarion on it, and so he called Ferrus to his side so that the four brothers could meet in council. Horus spoke of treachery on a vast scale, of half the legions turning their backs on the Emperor. Vulkan was staggered to learn of the deaths of two of his brothers, and struggled to keep his composure when he heard the fate that had befallen the Raven Guard. The four brothers discussed strategies for days on end, and finally came up with a plan that they could all agree on. Vulkan returned to planning the defense of Terra, while his other three brothers departed with their fleets.

Defense in Depth

Vulkan now began to feel the pressure of his office more intensely than ever before. Defense of the Palace was foremost, which meant Vulkan would need to trade space for time. Thus the forces of the Warmaster were given free rein to meet the traitors on their own terms out in the field. With the Emperor occupied below, it was unclear whether the office of Warmaster, Regent, or Praetorian held the most authority, and such a conflict could prove to be a fatal distraction. Thus Horus took the offensive, leading their brothers Mortarion and Ferrus, while Malcador kept to his own devices. His authority secure, Vulkan busied himself turning Terra into a fortress at an incredible rate. Horus's reports showed the two primarchs most suited for a siege, Dorn and Perturabo, were both traitors, and so Vulkan could not allow them to fight the battle on their terms. Therefore Vulkan had to change the dynamic.

Instead of focusing all efforts on the Palace, which is what Dorn or Perturabo would likely do in his position, Vulkan concentrated on dispersing his forces throughout Terra. His Salamanders would become force multipliers, strengthening the Imperial Army divisions across the Solar System, to make the traitors divert resources to take the entire planet lest they be struck from behind after they landed. Hives became heavily armored fortresses, serving as dispersed nodes for garrisons across the planet. Vulkan utilized the sheer numbers present on Terra to drastically improve industrial output to make up for the loss of importation, as well as draft billions to form new regiments of the Imperial Army. The vast orbital platforms were turned into killing zones, and Vulkan ordered them moved into geosynchronous orbit above the palace. The atmosphere above was seeded with small, self-replicating mines, equipped with miniature cloaking devices Vulkan himself designed using archaeotech schematics provided by Malcador the Sigillite. Higher up, the dark side of Luna was covered in massive turret arrays meant for taking out starships, and satellites were repurposed into the modern equivalent of ancient fire-ships, strapped with explosives to be used as torpedoes.

Such preparation took time, and while Vulkan crafted his defenses, his allies fought and died on the vast defensive front known as Bastion Omega. Vulkan sent what forces he could spare, comparing the losses and gains of the casualty figures he received in return. Four years passed, and the resources coming into Terra began to dwindle, as more and more worlds fell to the traitor advance. Vulkan began sending out prototype weapons, scavenged from Dark Age of Technology relics, as well as some he created himself, in an attempt to slow the advance. By this time, Mars was mostly retaken, the hereteks and rebels driven into small holdouts besieged by the forces of the Fabricator General and the remaining Iron Hands who stayed to assist after Ferrus left to help Horus. With the aid of the Mechanicum, he helped organize the supply chain for the new MK VI Pattern of Astartes Power Armor, which they named the Corvus Pattern after the fallen primarch of the Raven Guard; this first martyr of the Heresy was also honored when the Lord of Drakes ordered Lion's Gate Spaceport renamed to Raven's Gate. All manner of Imperial forces rotated in and out of the Solar System, most notably a small Alpha Legion fleet led by Alpharius himself, whom Vulkan had not seen in many years. Vulkan did not trust Alpharius, but could not afford to turn away any help, and listened intently to his advice on how to optimize the defenses.

After several days of council between the Hydra and the Lord of Drakes, the brothers were alerted to an attack on Pluto by the Imperial Fists. Such an attack, if allowed to succeed, would give the traitors a beachhead for their invasion, and so must be uprooted before they could dig in. Vulkan gave command of one of his fleets to Alpharius, and began mobilizing his forces to support his brother's counter-attack. He sent word to Ferrus, ordering him to withdraw to defend Pluto, and Ferrus promised his support. Within a week Alpharius sent word that the traitors had retreated, warning Vulkan that the traitors had acquired intelligence on the defenses. Vulkan resupplied his brothers, and sent them back into the field to slow the traitors down just a bit longer. They dispatched the remaining Titan legions of Mars into the field, led by Legio Mortis, in order to draw the traitor titans away towards the battlefield of Beta-Garmon, while the bulk of the legionaries moved to the planet of Verzagen. These two battlefields would be the last line of defense, one final chance to stop the traitors before they reached the Solar System. If both of these failed, then Vulkan estimated that the traitors would arrive within a year, and so resolved to remove the knife at his back in advance.

The Regent of Terra, Malcador the Sigillite, assumed command as the Praetorian descended into the depths of the dungeons, entering his father's Great Work. There he joined the Custodes and the Silent Sisters, along with the Unifiers, who had been waging a losing battle to keep the daemonic hordes from escaping past them. He fought by their side for a year against the myriad horrors which infested the misty tunnels of the Webway. By this time, barely a tenth of the Legio Custodes survived, whittled down through constant conflict. Their foes were many and varied: traitor legionaries, corrupted titans, and daemons of all four choirs. The Fourth Legion was here in force, dozens of grand battalions supported with all their heavy armor, grinding themselves against the beleaguered defenders. No son of Perturabo could stand against the might of the Custodes, but it mattered little when they outnumbered them a hundred to one. Tens of thousands Iron Warriors had fallen, their corpses ground into the wraithbone pathways as their fellows marched over them in endless numbers.

In other tunnels lay the enemy titans, who sought out their loyalist counterparts in a struggle between giants, while swarms of corrupted skitarii clashed with the Unifier cohorts around their feet. Worst of all were the daemons, who fought with each other as much as with the Silent Sisterhood sent to oppose them. Vulkan fought against all foes, a giant in green scaled armor towering over the sons of Perturabo who threw themselves at him, desperate to get revenge against the one who had stolen their father's place as Praetorian. He led daring attacks on traitor titans, leaping from Ares Dropships to slaughter his way through their crews, crushing their mutated bodies which were fused into the command thrones and leaving the titans to fall dormant without direction. He slew daemons of every description as they screamed and gibbered at him, shrieking at the presence of a son of the Anathema. Despite his best efforts though, the foe was simply too numerous, and the defenders prepared to make their last, desperate stand in the ruins of the Aeldari city known as Calastar.

Vulkan swung his hammer, crushing the daemon into pulp. He swung again, and again, and again. All around him, the daemons flowed in a never-ending tide, shrieking their names at him, revealing their nature in the instinctual fashion of their kind. Truly the warp was a vile place, and Vulkan could not tell why Magnus had ever shown such interest in it, nor did he think he would have a chance to. He was not surprised the sorcerer-king had not shown himself since fleeing Terra: his brother had always used others to do his dirty work for him.

Distracted by his thoughts, the Lord of Drakes paid for his momentary lapse in attention, the rusty sword of a leering, diseased cyclops stabbed into his shoulder before being smashed into putrid ichor by Dawnbringer. Vulkan snorted at the thought of his weapon's name. There was no dawn here, just perpetual misty twilight. Vulkan had died dozens of times down here: vaporized by Iron Warrior missiles, crushed underneath a titan's foot, hacked into pieces by daemonic blades. Every time, the Custodes had rushed forward and dragged his remains back to the central tower in the Impossible City, and every time he awoke again. He wondered how many deaths he had left in him.

The tide of daemons receded, the never-ending horde parting like a wave as the monsters turned to flee. As Vulkan took advantage of this momentary lull, he heard colossal thuds, the sound of something truly massive heading towards him. At first he thought it was a traitor titan. Then he heard the voice in his head. +END OF EMPIRES. END OF EMPIRES. END OF EMPIRES.

Vulkan watched the thing lurch out of the mist. Some sort of horrific daemon, fused with the remains of a knight, vast draconic wings unfurled from its back. Blood and oil dripped from its maw as it stared at Vulkan with one malicious eye. Vulkan hefted his hammer. Somehow, he knew he could not defeat this daemon, but nor could he allow it to get past him. He had lost his helmet some time ago, and so he shouted his defiance with a booming voice. "Only in death does duty end!" The monster roared in reply as it continued to psychically scream its name at him. Then behind Vulkan, the sun rose.

Dawn came to the Webway, as the Emperor himself entered the battle, freed from his Golden Throne for one day. Vast flames filled Calastar: fiery shapes of dead Custodes, as well as silhouettes of Astartes led by a shadowy giant with vast, black wings. The Nineteenth Son of a dying empire, reborn in his father's fiery wrath.

I AM THE END OF EMPIRES! I AM YOUR DEATH!+ the daemon screamed at the Emperor. The giant at the Emperor's side roared back. +I AM VENGEANCE INCARNATE! I AM JUSTICE DELIVERED!

The two entered battle, while all around them the fires of the Emperor swept through the daemonic hordes, burning them to ash. Vulkan knew he was out of his depth here, but still he stayed, fighting by his father's side. The Emperor began to chant, and the daemon staggered as if struck. The Emperor turned to Vulkan, and he heard his father speak in his mind, though his mouth continued to chant. Vulkan held up his Sigil, marked with the Emblem of the Dragon, and handed it to the nearest Custodian, Tribune Ra Endymion. Ra grabbed the Sigil and ran up to the daemon, pressing it into its side, and it screamed as though the Sigil burned it. The vast daemon engine collapsed, and the Custodes staggered as if struck before he began running deeper into the Webway. The Emperor and Vulkan fled back through the Webway Portal, which collapsed behind them. As Vulkan struggled to catch his breath, he was appalled to note the hundreds of coffins attached by cables to the throne, his superhuman mind quickly grasping their purpose. Vulkan returned to the surface as the Emperor stared blankly ahead from the Golden Throne, already straining from the pressure as a single tear rolled down his face.

Siege of Terra: The Anvil

The mood on Terra was grim in the last year of the siege. All of Terra knew the war wasn't going well, and morale became an issue among the mortal populace. The Salamanders had to put down multiple riots across the planet, resorting to deadly force to keep order. Vulkan was kept busy, finalizing the defenses as he positioned his forces in preparation for the final conflict. Before leaving the dungeons, he attached a device to the Golden Throne. Created from schematics given to him by Malcador, the Talisman of Seven Hammers was, to the best of Vulkan's knowledge, some sort of failsafe device to be used should the traitors take the Palace. After it was attached to the Golden Throne, Malcador left Terra, saying only that his presence would be required on Titan. Scans showed the entirety of Saturn became shrouded in a massive storm shortly after he arrived there. The remaining primarchs returned to Terra with their battered fleets, speaking of disastrous losses at Beta-Garmon and Verzagen. Together Vulkan, Horus, Mortarion, and Ferrus prepared to hold back the tide of traitors until reinforcements could arrive. All knew the traitor's arrival would come once the planets of the Solar System had aligned, and they arrived right on the first day of the first month, 000020, M31. The Solar War had begun: the legions of hell had come to snuff out the last embers of the Emperor's vision.

Auspexes detected enemy fleets arriving at both the Khthonic and Elysian Gates, right as anticipated. The guns of Pluto and Uranus began firing: thousands of platforms firing at millions of targets. Vulkan monitored the tactical situation grimly from his command center of the Bhab Bastion, watching as the green dots representing his forces vanish one by one from the screens. His own sons were protecting Pluto, while Mortarion defended the Elysian Gate. The Solar System had been divided into five spheres, rings of defense designed to slow the traitors down and bleed them out. The first sphere comprised Neptune and Pluto, and the space beyond it. The first foes engaged consisted of thousands of ships piloted by daemons and abominable intelligences, sent as cannon fodder to cover the main traitor fleets. The loyalist fleets were hopelessly outnumbered, but they made the traitors pay dearly for every ship they destroyed, destroying hundreds of vessels sent as cannon fodder to tire them out.

While the fleets battled above, the five moons of Pluto were assaulted by the Dark Angels, each traitor legionary supported by dozens of killing machines known as the Excindio Battle-Automata. The Dark Angels had long utilized forbidden weaponry, and the Heresy had led them to use truly evil technologies now that they were no longer shackled to the Emperor's decree. The Excindio were not truly Men of Iron, but rather crude imitations, mechanical frames inhabited by minor daemons bound into them. As the Salamanders assigned to hold Pluto struggled to maintain their defenses against such horrors, Vulkan ordered his sons to deploy the first of his countermeasures. From the bow of his flagship, Chalice of Fire, the Iron Dragon unleashed the Song of Entropy.

Song of Entropy

Throughout his years of service to the Emperor, Vulkan crafted thousands of weapons and tools designed for the betterment of mankind. The greatest of these was the Chalice of Fire, a vast forge-ship created by the Mechanicum under Vulkan's oversight to serve as the flagship of the Eighteenth Legion. The entire ship was covered in a unique adamantium alloy created by Vulkan himself, allowing the ship to take extreme punishment. Mounted all over the ship were dozens of different experimental weapons, and it was common for Vulkan to test out these new weapons in the heat of battle, noting their merits and constantly improving them.

When the Salamanders withdrew to Terra to become its Praetorians, the Chalice sat unused for nearly a decade, sitting in a space-dock while Vulkan upgraded its systems in his spare time. The ship itself was commanded by the Iron Drake, Cassian Vaughn. Mortally wounded in battle against the orks, Vaughn was interred within a unique dreadnought chassis of Vulkan's own design called the Iron Drake. The former legion master was now able to integrate himself into ships using the unique connection ports Vulkan installed in the same manner as a techmarine would. The Iron Drake was now the head of the Chalice of Fire, master of its deadly weaponry. The Song of Entropy was but one of its many weapons, an experimental wave-motion cannon made of a rare black material Ferrus found and gave to Vulkan during the Great Crusade. The power source was limited, and required recharging after each shot. The effects of the blast were temperamental, and seemed to not to damage physical objects at all, though it proved extremely effective against creatures touched by the Warp. Thus Vulkan kept it as a weapon of last resort, saving it for truly dire situations.

The tactical map showed the Iron Drake that Pluto was about to fall, and so he fired the Song of Entropy. A vast green wave rippled out from the Chalice of Fire like a dragon's flames, bathing the entirety of Pluto and its moons in eerie green light. Wherever the light touched, the machines stopped in their tracks, the daemons animating them screaming as they were banished back to the warp. The Dark Angel sorcerers staggered as their connection to the Warp was severed, and the daemonic growths on any ships caught in the blast began to wither and die. The loyalists took advantage of the confusion, reaping a great slaughter on their disoriented opponents who seemed dazed without their connection to the Warp. This advantage proved short lived, and the sheer numbers of traitors proved too much for the defenders.

On Neptune, the Salamander fleets clashed with the armada of the Thousand Sons. The Salamanders and Thousand Sons fleets were almost evenly matched, for the Thousand Sons had ever been the smallest legion, but that advantage disappeared as the Thousand Sons began to summon daemons on an unmatched scale. Millions of daemonic creatures of every description manifested around the traitors' ships, swarming like a living tide as they soaked the shots of the Salamanders, who were forced to raise their own Gellar Fields lest their ships be swarmed. Any shots that made it through the endless tide were deflected by powerful sorcerous shields, which then parted to allow the Thousand Sons to strike back unharmed. The Thousand Sons spent the entire battle summoning endless amounts of daemons, which swarmed over the moons of Neptune in a never-ending tide. While the small garrisons defended their outposts, microscopic daemons infested the guns, corrupt scrapcode turning their massive turrets away from the ships of the Thousand Sons and onto each other. In the gaseous depths of Neptune itself, massive daemonic creatures lurked, swallowing the gas mining platforms whole. Within several days, both planets had fallen silent, the shattered loyalists forced to abandon their defenses. The first sphere had fallen.

At the Elysian Gates, the forces of the Death Guard clashed against the inexorable tide of the Emperor's Children. Mortarion himself led this fleet, and took grim satisfaction in reaping his revenge against the forces of Fulgrim as they defended the second sphere. This was a battle of resilience, as the two fleets bled each other dry for days as they pounded each other from afar. The once-proud ships of the Emperor's Children looked diseased and rusted, taking far more punishment than they should be able to. The moon garrisons across the twenty-seven satellites reported that the boarding parties looked little better, each traitor legionary a bloated, shambling mess, with faded purple armor the color of a bruise, putrid and rotten. Nevertheless the Death Guard were used to fighting in the worst conditions, and they sealed their armor against contagion, grimly wading into the thick of things to hack the traitors to pieces. The Death Guard unleashed their full arsenal, covering multiple moons in ever-burning phosphor and crackling rad-zones. However, the enemy's numbers proved too much, and the grim Death Guard performed their duty to the end, detonating multiple moons to take their foes with them as their fleet retreated. The second sphere fell around the same time as the first, having bought several precious days of time.

The third sphere consisted of the nearly three billion kilometers of space between Uranus and Mars, and was the bulk of the Solar defenses. Thousands of pockets of defenders filled this vast expanse, spread across hundreds of moons and platforms that turned the traitor advance into a killing field. Saturn was ringed by a vast storm, which shredded any traitors who tried to enter the boundaries of its mighty ring, and after several attempts the traitors simply ignored it and moved on. The ring itself hid a deadly surprise within its loose collection of ice and rock, and when the traitors strayed too close, a small Tenth Legion fleet assaulted them. Powered down to avoid detection, the sons of Ferrus launched a deadly ambush, drawing the enemy into guerrilla warfare in the ring itself. The asteroid belt was in a similar state, filled with thousands of small gun platforms that slowed and harassed the enemy fleets as they swept through. The forces of the Iron Warriors assaulted Jupiter, impervious to losses as they marched across the Galilean satellites in massive armored columns, the vast dust plains proving the perfect battlefield to clash against the mechanized forces of the Sons of Horus. Horus himself took the field on the moon of Ganymede, routing the Iron Warriors tasked with conquering the Jovian Shipyards. Within Jupiter itself, the Thousand Sons led by one of their most powerful Magisters raced to perform a hideous ritual as they clashed with the Sixteenth Legion Librarians. The Thousand Sons proved unstoppable, and the endlessly churning Great Red Spot became a horrific dark rip into the Warp.

Emerging from this scar upon reality were tens of thousands of new vessels, the rest of the traitor armada finally entering the battle far closer to Terra. At the head of this impossible armada was the Invincible Reason, flagship of the Dark Angels, and the titanic Phalanx, surrounded by the fleets of the other traitor legions. Such a force would have taken weeks to transition from the Warp into realspace if they were using the Khthonic or Elysian Gates, yet this rift somehow allowed them to transition far more quickly. Vulkan recognized that the battle there was lost, and ordered Horus and his forces to fall back. The Sons of Horus could not stand up to such numbers, and were forced into a fighting retreat as Ganymede became irreparably tainted by the Warp. The third sphere held out for several weeks, but finally fell by the end of the first month of fighting.

The fourth sphere consisted of Mars and its immediate environs, and was defended by the forces of Ferrus Manus. Most of the traitor armada simply sailed past Mars, leaving it to be assaulted by the various contingents of Dark Mechanicum and the Ultramarines. The Iron Hands fought these scattered rabble across the Ring of Iron that circled the Red Planet as they struggled to keep the traitors from freeing their traitorous kin trapped on the surface below. Several weeks were spent as the forces of the Fabricator General struggled to keep the traitors contained, though this was impossible from the outset. All knew that Mars would not be able to hold, but the Iron Hands fought knowing that every traitor they forced to Mars would be one less to blacken the face of Terra. When Ferrus was finally forced to retreat, he would not speak of the horrors the Iron Hands faced there. So fell the fourth sphere.

The final and fifth sphere was Terra itself, commanded by Vulkan. Defending the skies of Terra were more platforms and satellites than the first two spheres combined. Based on the calculated traitor losses, many defenders believed their foes had lost too much to be able to swiftly storm Terra, and were confident they would be able to hold until reinforcements could arrive. Vulkan knew their chief ally was time itself, time for reinforcement fleets to arrive and strike the traitors from behind. Thus the defenders of Terra made their foes pay dearly as they clashed in orbit, their fleets supported by the guns of Luna and the many orbital platforms. Hundreds of traitor ships fell by the time the last guns were taken. The orbital platforms proved harder to subdue, as the massive minefields blew the traitor landing craft apart into thousands of scraps. After days of fighting, the remaining loyalist ships fled the planet, ceding the skies of Terra as they retreated to join up with the Iron Hands forces that had retreated from Mars.

On the Thirteenth of Secundus, the might of the traitors descended upon Terra, as millions of the lost and the damned rained from the skies in transports of every description. Mutants and beastmen, rebel Army soldiers, mortals of every description threw themselves at the thin lines of loyal Imperial Army who held the outer trenches. For an entire month they fought, even as the massive guns of the Palace continued to hurl massive shells at the traitor vessels blotting out the skies above them. Such tactics were no doubt designed to exhaust the defenders and their supplies, forcing them to expend ammo upon worthless rabble and reveal the gaps in their defenses.

After several weeks of inconclusive fighting, the Walls still held, though dozens of bastions across hundreds of kilometers of defenses had fallen, shattered whenever the Aegis flickered and allowed a stray shot within. Vast siege guns now surrounded the Palace, both sides firing nonstop creating a wall of deafening sound. Yet this was only the prelude, and on the Fifteenth of Tertius, the Angels of Death joined the battle. Drop pods from every legion began to rain down on the surface, as the full force of the traitors seized the approaches to the Palace, a circumvallation of seven siege camps. After establishing their foothold and beginning their bombardment, the Lion's forces moved to take the two spaceports closest to the Palace which would allow them to land heavier support. While the Crimson Fists and Iron Warriors moved to extend their siege around the Palace, their allies abandoned them, scattering to assault the rest of the Throneworld which had as yet received bombardment but not invasion.

Across Terra, the Blood Angels, Ultramarines, and Emperor's Children clashed with the dispersed forces of the Salamanders and Alpha Legion, who fought them from every hive. Such a strategy infuriated Dorn and Perturabo, who were forced to divert their forces to assist the other legions in taking the hive cities lest their allies grind themselves ineffectually against the extensive garrisons. Days turned into weeks, as the loyalist primarchs clashed with their traitor brothers, who began to manifest on Terra itself as the Emperor's wards faded and retracted. Vulkan remained within Bhab Bastion, directing the defenders as they protected an ever-shrinking line of defense, trading wings of the palace for more time as they lured the traitors into kill-zones.

Intelligence suggested that the Dark Angels had not committed their forces yet. They had landed in force in the plains of Urartu, and there they remained, constructing a small fortress, a command bunker from which the Archtraitor could command the Siege. The Alpha Legion reported that no forces could get close to it, and Vulkan pushed it to the back of his mind, for there were much greater dangers. All the traitor legions were now present, reinforced by swarms of daemons and their mortal allies, though only five traitor primarchs had yet been seen. The loyalists battled their corrupt forces across the continents, and began to turn the tide at great cost, as brother fought brother in a never-ending bloodbath. Each traitor legion was fought off, one by one, as Perturabo and Dorn sabotaged each other while struggling to enlist their dissolute allies in supporting their respective push towards the Palace.

A vast tug-of-war developed, as the loyalists led by Mortarion struck out and retook Raven's Gate spaceport, slowing the arrival of new traitors and forcing them to take it back yet again. In response, Perturabo unleashed the berserk Sanguinius, who fell onto the Eternity Wall like a fiery meteor, and by his daemonic presence brought the fury of the Blood Angels to new heights, forcing Horus to confront him directly as the Blood Angels converged on the palace. The Emperor's Children unleashed colossal siege towers, dripping with pestilence and topped by catapults which launched putrid barrages of coalesced filth. Howling packs of Star Hunters, now calling themselves the White Scars, rode in unstoppable charges across the battlefields, killing their allies as much as they did the defenders as they sowed anarchy.

As Vulkan directed the battle, he noted all variables and potentials, planning out a defense the likes of which had never before been seen. Throughout the months of fighting, he continued to direct the campaign from his strategium, knowing that his work here outweighed any potential benefits of entering the battle directly. Despite his incredible efforts, they were losing. Dark sorceries wracked Terra as daemons of every description began to manifest, called by the bloodshed and feeding upon the tides of emotion. The loyalists were restricted into ever-shrinking islands of resistance surrounded by the tides of the enemies on all sides. Despite the heroics of individual sectors, the Palace was on the verge of falling, mountains of the dead piled around it on all sides.

By the month of Sextus, relief finally began to arrive, as the vanguard of the Night Lords, long thought lost, arrived in the atmosphere above, shortly followed by the armada of the Word Bearers. The traitors were caught between the defenders above and below, and hope was enkindled once more. Vulkan received word from his brother Lorgar, who led the fleets above, and relayed his command codes, ordering him to broadcast a signal which would tell the hidden surviving fleets to converge on Terra for the counter-attack. As Vulkan continued to direct the forces and coordinate them with the new arrivals, he felt an immense presence in his mind.

Vulkan blinked. A second ago he was in the Bhab Bastion, directing his aides as they struggled to link the loyalist armies with the newly arrived forces in orbit. Now he stood on the lip of a volcano, the noise of the command center replaced with the soft whisper of a breeze and the gentle bubbling of the magma below him. Looking down, Vulkan beheld a lush green jungle far below him that reached to the shores of an endless blue ocean. He turned around, and beheld a man garbed in simple clothing with a floral design as opposed to the ornate golden armor Vulkan was used to.

"Vulkan. This may be the last time we are able to speak."

"What is this, father? Where are we?" Vulkan asked. The Emperor smiled.

"This is Terra, as it was tens of thousands of years ago. A memory of mine. I go now to confront your brother. Before I do, I just wanted to take this time to tell you to be yourself. Become who you were meant to be. You are unlike any of your brothers, and that is my proudest accomplishment. Farewell son." Vulkan tried to speak, but found himself back in the Bhab Bastion, no time at all passed.

Troubled by his father's words, Vulkan resumed the defense with growing unease. As reports that the traitors were falling back began to come in, he felt the presence of the Emperor lessen, and realized his father had found a way to step off of the Golden Throne. Such an occurrence was disturbing, for no mortal psykers had been brought into the palace since the beginning of the siege. However, Vulkan knew his role in the Emperor's plan was to continue to hold the Palace even without the Emperor being there, and so he held it. The Palace itself was filled with hordes of traitors, and despite the arrival of reinforcements, they would never arrive in time. As such, he unleashed his final weapon: the Custodes. Freed from the War in the Webway, they had spent the final year training and preparing for this moment. Though there were fewer than a thousand Custodes left, the traitors were no match for the enraged guardians of the Emperor, who struck them from all sides. Vulkan yearned to venture out and fight Dorn or Perturabo, to strike them down for ruining the Emperor's vision, but he knew his place was to stay and focus on the bigger picture. His chance to duel them disappeared as they fell back, and the Palace was cleansed of the invaders.

Still directing the defense hours later, Vulkan received the news that finally brought him out of his command post. As Lorgar entered the Palace, Vulkan emerged to learn the horrific truth: Konrad was dead, and the Emperor nearly so. It is said that Vulkan wept when he saw his father's mangled body, and led Lorgar back into the depths of the Imperial Palace. He was surprised to see Mortarion step down from the Throne, for he had not heard from his brother in some time. Vulkan carried his brother's withered body away as Lorgar ignited the Golden Throne behind him, its radiance casting Vulkan's shadow a great distance. The Heresy was over. The Anvil of Terra had held despite all the many blows it had received, and it was time to rebuild.

Post-Heresy: The Hammer

The Imperium had been maintained, though the price was almost too high to bear. Terra was utterly devastated: what little progress made to restore its fragile ecosystems had been ruined during the Siege. It took many years before the mountains of corpses could be properly disposed of and the sheer cost calculated. The Salamanders had taken the brunt of the casualties during the Solar War, and barely a tenth of the legion had survived. Nonetheless, the Salamanders were no strangers to rebuilding after disastrous losses. Their fortress monastery had come under attack by opportunistic raiders during the Siege, though its walls still held, for Venus held very little to offer any invader. With its gene-seed stocks secure, the Salamanders were able to rebuild more quickly than other legions, and they could be seen all across Terra helping to rebuild.

Vulkan's part in the Scouring was very limited, and he focused on rebuilding the shattered Throneworld while his brothers took a more active role elsewhere. Vulkan was assisted in this task by the return of Malcador the Sigillite from Saturn. The mysterious regent kept his activities a secret, and it is said only Mortarion knew for certain. Vulkan and Malcador managed the logistics of the returning loyalist forces, and assigned them to where they would be most effective, though most joined the Warmaster's forces in the Scouring. The Imperial Palace was rebuilt, its battered walls repaired and strengthened. As the decades passed and Terra was restored to some of her former glory, Vulkan continued to ponder the Emperor's final words to him. He visited the Golden Throne several times, but received no additional visions, no further wisdom. Vulkan remained with his brothers for centuries as they disappeared one by one, until finally it was just Vulkan left. In their absence had arisen the edifice of the Imperium, and although Vulkan could have ruled over the High Lords of Terra, he was content to withdraw from active rule. He had no desire to be a Lord Commander or Warmaster, and he spent his days traveling between Venus and Terra, guiding his sons as they flourished under his tutelage. Thus by M32, the Salamanders were one of the largest legions, dispersed throughout Segmentum Solar while Vulkan trained the new aspirants personally.

Such peace was to prove short-lived. Around the year 500 of M32, a Waagh! of unparalleled size swept through the Imperium. A force of Salamanders had been clearing a small xenos infestation when an orkish horde assaulted them. Their sheer numbers meant the Salamanders called for reinforcements, though these reinforcements were crushed by ork vessels of unusual size and potency, the barbaric xenos using an unexpected level of strategy. The rampaging Orks smashed through the scattered lines of the Imperium, and the Salamanders were no exception. Spread out in a collection of garrisons throughout Segmentum Solar, the Salamanders took horrendous losses as the Orks crushed their fleets one by one using massive transports known as attack moons that allowed them to move far more swiftly than their Imperial counterparts, while their sheer numbers allowed them to ignore the lopsided casualties inflicted upon them in return. Humanity's response to such slaughter was impotent at best, the High Lords of Terra bickering amongst themselves on how to direct the counter-offensive, leading to the loss of almost the entirety of Battlefleet Solar in gallant but doomed assaults on the orkish fleets. Most of the other Legiones Astartes were dispersed among the fringes, and were capable of nothing more than piecemeal assaults on the ork fringes while the Salamanders took the brunt of the assault head-on. The green tide swept into the Solar System itself, a vast attack moon orbiting above Terra. The High Lords utilized flawed strategies, forbidding the Astartes from Terra from leaving the Palace walls while sending millions of Terra's citizens in a series of doomed assaults known as the Proletarian Crusade, where the citizen militia landed piecemeal upon the world only to be swiftly isolated and destroyed.

With the failure of the High Lords to contain the orks, the Salamanders garrison were finally permitted to call for aid, and Vulkan himself emerged from his seclusion on Venus to lead the counter-attack, boarding the Ork attack moon and destroying it from the inside. While Vulkan was on the moon itself, one of the High Lords, Drakan Vangorich, Master of the Assassins, took it upon himself to execute the rest of the incompetent High Lords of Terra, a feat which became known as the Beheading. When Vulkan returned to Terra afterwards, he was thus presented with a fait accompli, and allowed Vangorich to remain in power for now. The Imperial Palace itself was attacked, though not by orks. A force of mysterious Aeldari calling themselves the Harlequins entered the Palace by unknown means, killing as they made their way towards the throne room. The furious Custodes stopped this incursion, killing all but one, who was turned over to the Inquisition. During interrogation, their leader claimed to be sent by Farseer Eldrad, who called himself a friend of Alpharius, long since presumed dead. Vulkan was unsure of this claim, but left to deal with the orks, trusting Vangorich to handle the situation, leaving behind an elite force of veterans to guard Terra from any additional xenos, ordering the Inquisition to see there would be no future violations of Terra. Imperial scholars now point to this order as the foundation of the Ordo Xenos, as well as its subsidiary branch, the Deathwatch.

Vulkan gathered a force from all the legions to strike back at the xenos interlopers, traveling to Mars to enlist the aid of the Adeptus Mechanicus, who had been silent thus far during the War of the Beast. Vulkan discovered they had been illegally experimenting with xenos technology in an attempt to teleport Mars itself away from danger, and forced the Fabricator General to aid his crusade, learning that the orks originated from Ullanor, the seat of their former empire. Thus Vulkan led the attack in a grand crusade the likes of which had not been seen since the end of the Scouring a millennia before as they pushed towards Ullanor. When they arrived on Ullanor, Vulkan landed with a small force to take out the head warboss, the titular Beast.

It was a slaughter. The orks were present in numbers unseen since the Great Crusade, and were physically larger than they were then, if that was possible. Vulkan's force was swiftly discovered, and he became the sole survivor, the other Astartes dying one by one as they fought their way into some sort of colossal temple. As Vulkan entered, what he had assumed was the wall began to move, revealing itself to be an ork of unparalleled size. Nevertheless, only in death does duty end, so Vulkan engaged the monster in combat. He fought the Beast for hours, and the creature proved capable of speech, taunting Vulkan that it was just the first. As the remains of the Crusade watched from high orbit, a massive explosion appeared around Vulkan's last known location, a crater miles in diameter marking where the temple had once stood. It was clear that Vulkan had died to take out their leader, and the battered fleet retreated out of the system. The Mechanicus adepts announced they had found a way to disperse the rest of the Waagh!, which were now rampaging uncontrollably without their leader. Utilizing the Silent Sisterhood, a reverse-Waaagh! field was created using the Sisterhood's null abilities that broke the psychic gestalt field that enabled the orks to fight effectively, and the orks were swiftly scattered, returning to the fringes to be dealt with by forces from the rest of the legions. The War of the Beast was finally over.

The Salamanders had taken horrendous losses, including their primarch. To hide such a devastating truth, the legion declared that Vulkan had simply disappeared like his brothers. In his place, the Salamanders selected a new legion master, though they keenly felt the absence of their father. Yet even with the seeming death of Vulkan, a legend swiftly sprang up in the Imperial Church, foretelling of the return of the Lord of Drakes in Terra's time of need. The Salamanders did not know what to make of this naïve optimism, yet they too longed for their father's return, and began to believe the prophecies themselves.

Vangorich continued to rule in place of the High Lords of Terra with the support of the Inquisition and tolerated by the Salamanders, though they stepped in when his decrees began to verge on madness. The Salamanders garrison on Terra ousted Vangorich from the Imperial Senate, pursuing him to the Temple of Assassins located at Terra's North Pole. There they were joined by a force of Alpha Legion, who helped them enter the temple, where they were set upon by all manner of assassins. The Salamanders fought their way through, and put an end to Vangorich's madness, though few Astartes survived the assault.

Having secured Terra, the Salamanders thus returned to their garrison duties across Segmentum Solar, patrolling the stars as they keep the Throneworld safe from all threats. When they returned to the Ullanor system to try to locate any remains of their Primarch, they discovered the entire planet was missing, believed to be the result of technological malfunction, for orkish technology was notoriously unreliable. The Eighteenth Legion have since nurtured a strong hatred for orks, and purge them from the stars wherever they are found. They continue to act as the Praetorians of Terra, and indeed are the only legion not feared by the populace of the Throneworld. The scars left on Terra are deep, but the birthplace of humanity is as resilient as the Salamanders themselves, and so they both continue to endure through the millennia, suffering through endless tragedy as they await the return of Vulkan to bring them hope once more.

Homeworld, Recruitment, and Gene-seed

The Eighteenth Legion has always placed a high priority on recruitment. Due to their relentless tenacity, the Salamanders have repeatedly been pushed to the brink of extinction, and so a high priority is placed upon new recruits. As the Praetorians of Terra, the Salamanders recruit across the Solar System, primarily from Terra due to its massive population and from Venus due to the harsh living conditions of that death world. Despite the frequency of recruitment, the Salamanders remain one of the smallest in terms of Legion size, as they are quite selective in choosing aspirants. The Salamanders wish for willing recruits, and only the bravest and most determined of aspirants who have overcome Terra's Lament approach the Salamanders outposts to ask to be admitted.

Terra's Lament

Most of baseline humanity is subject to what is known as 'transhuman dread', a physiological response to being in the presence of an Astartes, a being built for war. The dread is amplified in those who have seen a Space Marine in the heat of battle, as the brain struggles to comprehend how something so large could be so deadly and move so fast. The natives of Terra, however, have a condition a step beyond regular dread. Known as Terra's Lament, those who survived the depredations of Traitor Astartes during the Siege were left with deep traumatic scars that have been passed down through the generations, leaving the population to fear any Space Marine, not just those of traitors. The people of Terra freeze like a cornered prey animal in the presence of an Astartes, unable to move or form coherent thoughts until the Astartes has moved on. The Lament can be removed through extensive hypno-therapy, though this is cost-prohibitive, so few citizens undergo this procedure, generally those who are required to work with Astartes. The Salamanders use much less hypno-indoctrination in their recruitment process than the other legions, though an exception is made to remove the Lament early on during training so as to remove an unnecessary obstacle.

Salamander aspirants are taken as children, like all legions, and are brought to the Legion Monastery upon Venus. The harsh conditions of the death world are quite a shock to the aspirants who begin their training by marching the many miles from the space port to the Legion Monastery. Only the luckiest and hardiest reach the monastery, and those who fail this stage are removed from the selection process and returned to their families upon Terra. When the aspirants arrive at the monastery, they are placed in a boot camp similar to that of the Imperial Guard, where they learn physical fitness and teamwork. Each aspirant is assigned to a battle brother of the Legion, who trains them in Legion culture and philosophy. The Salamanders have retained their focus on forging and craftsmanship, and so the aspirants toil alongside their masters, assisting the Legionaries in crafting the tools for war. The aspirants train for several years, survival of the fittest weeding out any not suited to joining the legion, and eventually move on to become scouts and so on like in other legions. By this time, the aspirants have become fully immersed in the culture of the Legion, and any who fail at this stage are retained as Legion Serfs upon Venus to serve the Legion.

After being found by the Emperor, most primarchs chose their homeworlds to become the new recruiting ground for their legion. As one of the few primarchs without a viable homeworld, Vulkan was forced to retain the less reliable method of recruiting from conquered worlds. This was made easier by the methods of conquest Vulkan used: the Salamanders eagerly helped rebuild conquered worlds, which produced a greater willingness in these worlds to give their sons to the Salamanders. When Vulkan was named Praetorian, the Salamanders were transferred to Terra, and received exclusive rights to recruit from the Solar System, save for Mars itself, which remained the province of the Mechanicum. In practice though, only Terra held a high enough population to be worth recruiting from, and so the Salamanders set up recruiting stations across the Throneworld, drawing their recruits from the trillions who make their home upon the world of Humanity's origin.

Terra itself needs little introduction as the homeworld of Humanity. The ravages of Old Night destroyed the biosphere and stripped the oceans from the planet, and any progress made during the Great Crusade was ruined by the Heresy. The teeming masses of humanity eke out a living in vast hive cities across the planet, and it is believed that Terra has the most hives of any world. Despite this destruction and harshness, Terra remains the holiest world in the universe, the object of pilgrimage from across the galaxy. Thus Terra is also a shrineworld, the home of the Ecclesiarchy and the seat of the Imperium. The planet constantly receives massive fleets of pilgrims, who have traveled their whole lifetime to reach the sacred home of the Emperor. The entire Imperium is centered on the Imperial Palace built atop the Himalazian plateaus, sprawling for hundreds of square miles, and most pilgrimages are centered around this holy place, though few are allowed in. The Inquisition maintains several fortresses upon Terra, most notably near the South Pole, and the Ecclesiarchy is everywhere on Terra, with countless churches and holy monuments covering the surface. The Salamanders recruit from all across Terra, and the Astartes of the Eighteenth walk the hives, waiting for potential aspirants to overcome their instinctual fear to approach them as they work to lessen the effects of the Lament.

The Salamander gene-seed is relatively stable. It has a higher rate of rejection compared to other gene-seeds, though this is offset by the massive recruitment pool present on Terra. Aspirants implanted with the gene-seed exhibit increased resilience and strength, as well as several more unusual traits, including ember-like glowing eyes and a darkening of the skin to an almost pitch-black, regardless of origin. This darkening is believed to be a result of a malfunctioning Melanochrome organ due to both Vulkan's genetic legacy as well as the intense radiation found on Venus. The Salamanders have no known missing organs, and all work as intended save for the Melanochrome. The legion has but one recognized defect: the Obstinacy. The Eighteenth has always been known for its tenacity just like their gene-sire, and as a Salamander gets older and more experienced, this stubbornness only increases. The legion thus has a higher amount of dreadnoughts due to the refusal of legionaries to simply die despite grievous injury. However, this tenacity can lead to discipline issues, as the afflicted Salamander begins to believe he must hold his current course no matter the cost. This leads to a gradual slowdown in willingness to obey orders or deviate from their current mindset, especially in dreadnoughts, and many Salamanders have been killed due to failure to listen to the words of their brothers.

Combat Doctrines and Organization

The methods of war utilized by the Salamanders are built around resilience and firepower. Not for them the ambushes and trickery utilized by the Raven Guard or Alpha Legion, the Salamanders make no secret of their arrival, hitting the enemy hard and inviting them to hit them back, for none can endure a hit quite like a Salamander save perhaps the Death Guard. It is for this reason that the Eighteenth and Fourteenth Legions have a friendly rivalry. The Salamanders make no secret of their resilience, inviting the foe to focus everything on them. This is not mere boasting, rather, by focusing the foes attention upon themselves, this reduces the casualties of any allies. The Salamanders work extensively with the Imperial Guard, acting as the anvil to draw the enemy to them while the heavy firepower of the Guard falls like a hammer-blow once the foe is in position. This doctrine was recently exemplified during the Third War for Armageddon in 998 M41, when the Salamanders clashed with the Heretic Astartes of the 'Marines Malevolent' warband. This warband was a splinter from the Death Guard Legion, who took advantage of the chaos resulting from the Orkish invasion of Armageddon to raid the planet, stealing vital supplies and attacking loyal regiments of the Imperial Guard from behind. When the Salamanders commander Tu'shan heard of this, he brought his chapter to engage with the traitors, drawing them into a war of attrition for which the heretics were ill-prepared for, whittling away their resistance until they were forced to retreat. While the Salamanders occupied the attention of the traitors, the Guard regiments were able to continue battling the orks, and were later joined by the victorious Salamanders. For such honorable conduct, Tu'shan was decorated by Forgefather He'stan.

Forgefathers

Like most legions, the Salamanders are ruled by a Legion Master, which they call a Forgefather. Forgefathers are the heart of the legion: peerless warriors and master smiths, these mighty Astartes have led the Eighteenth Legion for time immemorial. The first Legion Master was Cassian Vaughn, a mighty warrior who fell against the orkish menace, and was entombed within a unique dreadnought sarcophagus created by Vulkan himself. However, most agree dreadnoughts cannot lead a legion, though the Iron Hands would beg to differ, and after the disappearance of Vulkan, the chapter masters met in council to choose a new leader. They elected T'kell, a techmarine famous for his defense of Pluto during the Solar War, who took the name of Vulkan in honor of their lost primarch. Each new Forgefather assumes the title of Vulkan, and takes an oath of office to find their missing primarch. The forgefathers have scoured the galaxy for ten thousand years, hoping against hope that their primarch still lives. Though Ullanor, the site of Vulkan's last known location, has long since vanished, several forgefathers have been drawn to the world of Armageddon for some unknown reason, and it is for this reason that the current Forgefather, Vulkan He'Stan, sent Chapter Master Tu'shan and a chapter of Salamanders to defend the world when they heard the orkish menace had returned to Armageddon once more.

The Salamanders make use of the same general equipment as the other legions, though with extra emphasis on flame weaponry. When Vulkan assumed command of his legion, he outlawed the use of the more destructive weapons such as rad or volkite weaponry, proclaiming them to be unworthy of the Emperor's warriors. It is for this reason that the Salamanders lack the destroyer squads found in other legions. Flame weaponry has an almost religious character for the Eighteenth: many squads make use of flamers instead of the more common plasma guns found in other legions, and their vehicles are marked with flame patterns as decoration. The legion has even created a unique variant of land raider known as the land raider redeemer, which sports multiple heavy flamers in place of other armaments.

The Salamanders maintain good relations with their fellow legions, especially the Iron Hands, and the two have fought in many campaigns together. They have the best relations with the Imperial Guard of any legion, and are noted for their willingness to fight against impossible odds to aid their fellow soldiers. The Eighteenth maintains positive to neutral relations with the Ecclesiarchy and Mechanicus; they have slightly more strained relations with the Raven Guard and High Lords of Terra due to their callous nature towards the masses of humanity. The Salamanders bear the same hatred towards their traitor brethren as do all the loyal legions. Of the Nine Traitor Legions, the Iron Warriors are the most reviled for their callous disregard for humanity and their petty grudges over being passed over for the position of Praetorian. However, this loathing pales in comparison to the hatred they bear for Aeldari. They make no distinction between the various xenos factions, considering them all to be equally vile, the legacy of their primarch's teachings during the Great Crusade. The Salamanders have become very adept at fighting orks, their flame weaponry scorching through the lightly armored greenskins and excising their taint from the land, preventing their vile spores from taking root.

The Salamanders have retained the same structure they had during the Great Crusade. They are divided into chapters of roughly a thousand like most legions, and are stationed across Segmentum Solar. Many chapters live in garrisons, from which they are seconded to fight alongside the Imperial Guard, whose teeming masses make up for the small numbers that most Legions fight as. Each Chapter Master is self-sufficient, and they make periodic visits back to Terra as chapters rotate in and out of active duty. A permanent garrison is present on Venus at all times, generally the chapter of the reigning Forgefather, who guard the fortress-monastery as well as train new aspirants. Another chapter is kept on Terra, focused on recruiting and interacting with the various governmental entities of the Imperium.

Beliefs and Warcry

Although the official home of the Salamanders is Terra, most of the legion's culture is based on Venus. The volcanoes and rift valleys of this scorching Death World have shaped the legionaries into what they are today, and the Eighteenth Legion conducts most of its business upon Venus as opposed to Terra. Venus has never been attacked as the defenses of the Solar System are too powerful, so the legion has imported a variety of wildlife to give their aspirants suitable challenges. Of particular note are the Venus dragons, mighty reptiles who lurk in the volcanoes of Venus in the same manner as the salamanders did on legendary Nocturne.

The teachings of Nocturne have slowly been forgotten over the millennia, the inevitable result of repeated near-destruction of the legion. It is estimated the legion has clawed its way back from extinction nearly a dozen times, and the legion has lost its senior officers in grueling campaigns nearly twice that number. The Hall of Heroes within Prometheus bears the banners of every chapter that has fallen in service to the Imperium, and keeps records of all the heroes and leaders who have died to uphold the honor of the legion. The Salamanders see themselves like the molten metal that they craft, repeatedly melted down only to be forged anew, stronger for the experience. Thus they are not overly bothered by changes in priority or direction, though they fight to maintain their humanity and adherence to their father's teachings. These teachings are kept in a massive libram known as the Tome of Fire, a legendary artifact said to have been written by the primarch himself. The Tome is actually a collection of volumes, each Forgefather adding his own wisdom during his tenure. Only the Forgefather is able to read the Tome, and it is said to be written in the ancient script of Nocturne, which few in the legion can read regardless. The Forgefather consults the Tome in times of great trial, seeking the wisdom of his forebears, and the Tome is contained at the heart of the fortress-monastery in a secure room known as the Pantheon that only senior officers can access. Despite the fact few have even seen the Tome, let alone read from it, all Salamanders honor its place in maintaining their legion's culture.

Like most Astartes, the Salamanders do not worship the Emperor as a god or acknowledge his divinity. The Ecclesiarchy dislikes this, but accepts it on a pragmatic level. The Salamanders have one unique belief, a reverence for the long-lost homeworld of Nocturne. When a legionary dies, he is brought back to Venus and is cremated, his ashes scattered inside Maat Mons. Maat Mons is the highest volcano on Venus, soaring nearly five kilometers above the surface and towering over the fortress-monastery, which is built upon its slopes. The Salamanders believe that the souls of any who are cremated in such a manner travel through the stars after their death towards Nocturne, where they will join the ranks of other departed Salamanders. This heaven is not just filled with Astartes: failed aspirants, deceased serfs, and even regular humans who die in service to the Emperor can have their ashes scattered in such a manner. Fire has thus taken on a special meaning for the Salamanders, a sacred way of transitioning to the afterlife, though they take offense to any foolish enough to imply that they worship it. One other belief of note is the prophecies of their father's return, a superstition even they themselves do not fully understand yet still believe deeply.

The Salamanders have several warcries that they commonly use. "Into the Fires of Battle, unto the Anvil of War!" is shouted by all the Salamanders when beginning a conflict, striking fear into the hearts of their foes. When facing orks or Traitor Astartes, the sons of Vulkan roar their father's name, chanting "Vulkan Lives", and stomping in unison in a synchronized motion that shakes the very battlefield they walk upon. The Salamanders bear the same bright green and black livery that they sported during the Great Crusade, and many decorate their armor with scales. Artisan armor is very common among the Eighteenth Legion, and many add hidden patterns of light in the infrared spectrum visible only to those with incredible eyesight such as other Astartes. The Salamanders bear the symbol of a drake's head upon their pauldrons and banners. Despite ten thousand years of searching, the Salamanders still believe their father waits for them somewhere amongst the stars, and await his return to lead them in glory once more.

The hooded figure panted from the exertions of combat. Strewn around his feet lay the putrid remains of traitor Astartes, the bastard sons of fallen brothers. The Emperor's Children had descended upon Armageddon spreading pestilence and despair across the battered world still reeling from the second orkish invasion. Few could stand up to their ravages, as most fighting men were at the front dealing with the ork hordes, and the traitors spread their plagues behind the lines before being confronted by the Hermit, who had come after hearing the frantic vox transmissions from the citizens.. There was but one Emperor's Children left to face him now, a bloated, scarred Astartes bearing a filthy blade. The Astartes grinned, marked by the morbid humor that was pervasive in the Third Legion, and spoke, his voice thick with phlegm.

"You face Lucius the Eternal, Child of the Emperor and grandchild of the god of pestilence who has granted me everlasting life. Come, join us in his embrace."

"There is only one child of the Emperor here, and you know nothing of eternal life." the Hermit replied, and rushed him. The traitor put up more of a fight than his brethren, though he fell within a minute just like the rest of his diseased kin.

As the Hermit stood above the traitor's shattered body, the hot winds blew his hood back, revealing skin the color of pitch and glowing red eyes. Lucius's eyes widened in recognition before they were crushed beneath the last blow of the mighty hammer. The Hermit doused his putrid remains with the cleansing heat of his flamer, and stepped back onto his transport as he prepared to return to his travels among the stars. Perhaps the next world would turn out to be Nocturne.

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AN: The Salamanders were fun to write, there was so many potential interactions that they could perform as a result of being the Praetorians and not getting wiped out before the Heresy even began like they were in canon. I hope by now many of you have started to recognize I like to put references in my stories, so I hope you've seen them for what they are. Please post comments on what you liked or didn't like, and next up will be the Word Bearers, so stay tuned, and may the Emperor Protect. Sharrowkyn, out.