Imperial Primer

Imperial
Primer
-
A
D a r k
H e r e s y
s o u r c e b o o k
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“It is the 41st Millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the
Golden Throne of Earth. He is the master of mankind by the will of the gods, and master of a million
worlds by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power
from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand
souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die.”
Credits
Credits
Created and written by:
Golden Tullis
Special Thanks
The Dark Reign web-site and Donato
Re-design
Mauvia
Artwork and Warhammer 40k Universe
See disclaimer
T
T
Disclaimer
Disclaimer
his document is completely unofficial and in no way endorsed by Games Workshop Limited or Fantasy Flight
Games. Games Workshop, Warhammer, Warhammer 40,000, Dark Heresy, the Dark Heresy logo, Black Industries, the Black Industries logo, BL Publishing, the BL Publishing logo and all associated races and race insignia, marks, names, characters, illustrations and images from the Warhammer 40,000 universe are either ©, ™ and/
or © Games Workshop Ltd 2000-2009, variably registered in the UK and other countries around the world.
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-
A
D a r k
H e r e s y
s o u r c e b o o k
-
T he 40K
universe
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C alixis S ector
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of content
Introduction
Introduction ............................... 7
Many Worlds, Many Cultures .............................. 7
Travel ....................................................................... 7
Communication....................................................... 8
Fascism and Freedom.............................................. 8
Technology .............................................................. 8
Psykers .................................................................... 9
Mutants . ................................................................. 10
Xenos ...................................................................... 12
The Inquisition . ..................................................... 12
Religion ................................................................... 13
Language . ............................................................... 14
History . .................................................................. 14
6
Many
Many Worlds,
Worlds,
Many Cultures
Cultures
Many
W
W
ith the abstraction of time, distance, and
travel, it is easy for an outside observer
to forget that every star-system in the
Imperium is divided by a vast, unpredictable, and
ultimately dangerous void. Culture, language, history,
philosophy, government, and sometimes even biology
develop organically and independently on every Imp
erial planet over the course of centuries or millennia,
free from significant influence beyond the gravity-well
of their sun. The resulting differences in humanity are
thus greater than anything that was known during the
age of Terra. It could be said, when comparing the
peoples of some worlds, that fellow Imperial citizens
are sometimes just as alien as the more approachable
Xenos.
I mperial P rimer
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ImperialPrimer
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and a peaceful shrine world filled with the faithful,
making works to further glorify the Emperor’s image
and name. (A look at the accompanying galactic and
sector maps should begin to give one a sense for the
full scale of the Imperium.)
Author’s Addendum: Note that this is assembled
with the year set to 950.M41, rather than the DH
default timeline in the 700’s. In addition, where there
are contradictions, ambiguity, or blank spots in the
lore, I have filled in with what I believe to be the most
rational conclusions where needed. Finally, as the lore
and “fluff ” that has been published is both massive and
a constantly changing and evolving thing, there may
be points where what is contained herein is no longer
accurate.
Travel
Travel
It is important then to remember just how different
everything is likely to be when visiting even the more
well-traveled foreign planets. The laws and customs
may vary such that behavior that’s taken for granted
on one’s homeworld may be offensive, disturbing,
or even criminal in another star-system. People of
different worlds, especially different classes of worlds,
look, speak, and think differently from each other. A
common mistake is to think in generalizations that
hold across the Imperium. Any statement that begins
with“In the Imperium…” or anything like it, is probably
30-40% true, at the absolute most. The sheer scale and
scope of the Imperium ensures that worlds that are not
part of a busy trade or military route can fall to enemy
action, heresy, rebellion, or any number of other fates
and not be discovered for decades (or more, in the case
of some backwater colonies). Generally, for more outof-the-way systems, it isn’t until investigators come to
find out why tithes have stopped being received that
these fates are discovered.
So, in short, the Imperium is generally unified in cause,
in faith, and in the need to survive. Beyond these
basic connections, the variation from world to world
is tremendous. In the same sector there can be junglecovered death-worlds with a few thousand citizens, all
fighting for survival as they reap the world’s resources,
along with a dystopic corporate/urban-wasteland of
wage-slave drones and cyberpunks, a half-feral frontier
planet populated by opportunists and prospectors,
T
T
ravel through the warp is done via two methods.
The most common and affordable is via the slow
but relatively reliable chartist vessels. Chartist
vessels do not have a member of the Navis Nobilae to
guide and calculate jumps for them, and rely on heavily
traveled and “smoothed” routes through the warp that
are pre-calculated for them. To get a sense for the
speed of these vessels, it takes 800 sidereal (standard)
days to travel from Scintilla to Malfi, or back. The
much more expensive and considerably faster method
is to make the warp jumps with a Navigator of the
Navis Nobilae. These mutant psykers can calculate
jumps on the fly to and from nearly any location in
the galaxy (and perhaps beyond, but most don’t like
to think about that). Consequently, the jumps are less
staggered and trips that would take a chartist vessel
years only take months or even weeks or days for a
Navigator guided vessel.
Using these “on the fly” calculations is much less
consistent than using the known routes of travel, and
while the trips are almost always shorter, there is a
staggering level of variance in sidereal and relative travel
time when making these jumps. On rare occasion a
trip that felt like a few days leaves the warp decades or
centuries later, or will sometimes simply arrive before
they actually left. Such is the way of the warp. Due to
these factors, the handful of people that travel through
the warp frequently find a difference begins to form in
their sidereal age (measured from the physical world)
and their relative age (time they experience from their
own perspective). Despite this, age is conventionally
measured in sidereal time. This is especially true in
Calixis, given the rumors (which are a plain, though
mysterious, fact in this case) about the world that
strikes dead any human over 40 sidereal years of age.
It should be noted that most people never leave the
planet of their birth, and would find the very idea
terrifying. Even those who might dream of traversing
the stars and exploring (or exploiting) new worlds will
7
I mperial P rimer
Fascism
and Freedom
Fascism and
Freedom
likely never do so, as the cost of even a single one-way
trip is prohibitive, and more than a common worker
could ever practically afford. The only exception
would be the rare pilgrim ship, which packs in poor
mendicants from every world on their route for a
fraction of the usual cost (and usually giving a fraction
of the space and comfort), as they travel to a shrine
world or similar holy site. For many of the devout this
is the culmination, and end of, their lives.
T
T
he Imperium is, without question, a fascist
state when taken as a whole. The only redress
that a citizen has against an imperial agent’s
misbehavior is to file a complaint that the agent
breached the protocol of their own agency, or in
extreme cases notifying the Inquisition of potential
heresy or treason (though these forms of redress do
exist, so it’s not quite a fully totalitarian regime). On
the other hand, unless the Imperial Guard is on world
for some reason, or someone is under investigation
by the Adeptus Arbites or worse the Inquisition,
most citizens will never interact with an agent of the
Imperium proper without actively seeking one out.
Communication
Communication
S
S
imilarly, while the methods of communication
within any given world may be as varied as
the worlds themselves, the only medium for
systems to communicate across the vast expanse of the
void is the warp. This is accomplished via the Imperial
soul-bound psykers known as astropaths. Astropathic
transmissions are the only means of relaying a message
or information between systems without carrying
it there in person (which is obviously both far more
expensive and dangerous). Only the most stable and
powerful of astropaths (and an even smaller fraction
of telepathic psykers) can open and maintain a direct
connection to another mind across the vast distances
of the void, and these will only be found operating
at the behest of individuals on par with the Lords of
Terra, the head of the Astropathic Choir, or the Great
Inquisitorial Lords.
More often, an astropath takes the message or
information and encodes it into a series of potent
psychological symbols. Taking this emotionally
charged symbolic message, they cast it out into the
warp towards their target (in a symbolic rather than
literal direction, it is far better to know who you are
sending to, rather than just where). If things go well,
the recipient will feel the incoming message and open
their mind to it, untangling the complex symbolic
code of the message to make it comprehensible for the
actual recipients of the message. While this is usually
incredibly fast, conditions such as warp storms,
damaged or non-existing transmission equipment,
or extreme stress or injury to the astropaths involved
can cause messages to be delayed, misdirected, lost,
or mistranslated. Still, it is far faster and safer than
travelling in person.
Each world has a handful of Imperial laws to obey and
responsibilities they are expected to fulfill, beyond
which they are largely allowed to rule themselves in
whatever manner they are accustomed to. This means
that each world is highly varied in the form of local
government and degrees of freedom individual citizens
enjoy (or don’t enjoy, such as on Sepheris Secundus).
As long as one does not violate the fundamental laws
of the Imperium, mainly prohibiting heresy, true and
overt apostasy, treason, any actions against lawful
imperial agents, and any theft of imperial resources,
the Imperium at large does not really care what you’re
up to. In fact, if one were to have the resources to
travel on their own terms, an individual could rather
easily seek out and move onto a world that is run in
a manner closer to their own ideals and principals.
Sadly, very few imperial citizens have such resources,
and those that do are generally far too comfortable to
bother with the dangers and stresses of travel, let alone
relocation.
Technology
Technology
As an interesting side note, the talents of the
Astropathic Choir make them the equals, and in many
cases superiors, of the Navis Nobilae in the realm
of divination. It is not uncommon for powerful or
wealthy individuals to hire on a personal astropath for
both communication and to act as their personal seer.
8
H
uman history, and the effects of various
technologies on history, has left humanity
with a strange attitude regarding anything
more complicated than a lever or pulley system.
Compounding this is the religion of the Machine
God and its priests. While the bulk of the Imperium
consider the Tech-Priests of Mars to be inscrutable and
inaccessible, the underlying views of the Mechanicum
have fully impressed themselves on all aspects of
Imperial life, primarily due to the singular control the
Mechanicum holds over the high technology required
for travel, war, and the sustenance of life in any hostile
environment.
So it is therefore an obvious and fundamental truth, to
most Imperial citizens, that every technological device
carries a sentient, self-aware, and at times willful,
soul. Even the most faithless and empirically minded
Imperial will find themselves muttering a plea to the
Machine God or the Omnissiah when trying to get a
Where the lines between the domains of the common
man, the Enginseers (the lay “clergy” indoctrinated and
trained by the Mechanicum, but not formally bound
to the cult, used to manage all the necessary but
common or menial tasks throughout the Imperium,
they are basically your standard mechanics), and the
Priesthood lie is largely a matter of the technological
base of the world in question. On a primitive
mining colony, a fully ranked Magos may oversee
the distribution and management of the mining
equipment throughout the planet, despite that the
next closest systems would never consider having even
a mech-wright lower themselves to overseeing such
basic mechanical equipment. The reasons for these
variations are cultural, and the sensitivity to their roles
as the guardians of humanity’s technology is why the
Mechanicum adapts to the local needs and customs
in such a manner. After all, even the most basic of
mechanical sensors are holy beings possessing a soul
that reflect the mind and will of the Omnissiah, and
exist as an expression of the Machine God’s glory.
Psykers
Psykers
W
W
ith the Imperium’s reliance on psykers for
communication, travel, defense against all
things warp spawned, along with the fact
that the Emperor is/was the most powerful psyker
ever to live, one might expect such people to be held in
high regard and be well respected. Unfortunately, an
untrained and unsanctioned psyker, even one normally
of modest psychic strength, can become a living
maelstrom and gateway of warp energy, damning entire
planets or star systems. Without having endured the
sanctioning process to cull, modify, and strengthen the
psykers of humanity, any given psyker is as likely to be
a living apocalypse as to become an asset to humanity
(most commonly however, they simply fall to some
horrible personal tragedy before either of these can
happen).
Accordingly, the ignorant masses regard the sanctioned
psykers of the Imperium with terror and suspicion,
while the cry of “witch” and purging flame is brought
to bear on any rogue psykers discovered hiding from
the Black Ships of the Inquisition (and sometimes
when anything weird happens and the rabble gets
spooked and confused). Even with the uniform and
rank of a Navis Nobilae or an Inquisitorial Rosette the
suspicion simply turns to bowel-liquefying terror and
dread. Astropaths are generally looked at as the least
“witch-like” and the more superstitious citizens tend to
simply be deeply uncomfortable or disturbed in their
presence, rather than outright terrified or hostile.
Every world is responsible for gathering up the psykers
of their population (on many worlds this can be more
than 1 per 100,000 people, though a majority of those
will be sensitives and latents that have not and cannot
actually manifest any ability without training, extreme
stress, and/or soul-binding). The gathered psykers are
then turned over to the black ships of the Inquisition,
which test and try the psykers as they return to Holy
Terra, where they are put to the role or fate that their
nature determines. It is one of the greatest acts of
Imperial treason to hide a psyker from the eyes of the
Imperium. Both because of the Imperium’s voracious
need for more loyal and properly prepared, and the
threat an independent and active psyker can become.
I mperial P rimer
particularly critical device to cooperate. Your average
gunslinger knows the litany of loading by heart, and it
is likely to pass their lips faithfully and by rote as each
new clip, pack, or round is chambered.
The weakest (of mind or will, not power), most
faithless, corrupted, or otherwise unsalvageable
psykers are sacrificed to the purifying light of the
Astronomican, where their energies further empower
the beacon that guides and protects humanity. Their
souls are saved from the warp, and become subsumed
by the presence of the Emperor, but their lives and
minds are obliterated. Those with the requisite faith
and devotion, but whose power cannot be trusted
to remain controlled are inducted into the Adeptus
Astronomica. It is the duty of these Adepts to focus
and contribute more directly to the strength and health
of the Astronomican through bonding, meditation,
and prayer. After years of dedication and training,
those who show the proper devotion and skill are
chosen to attempt an apotheosis of sorts, their souls
ascending to become a conscious and personal part
of the Astronomican at the Emperor’s side. Those
that fail return to their duties as teachers for the next
generation of Adeptus Astronomica devotees. Between
these two groups of psykers, thousands of psychic souls
are spent fueling the fires of the Astronomican every
single day. For many, these psykers go willingly, for this
fate ensures they will be protected from the hungers of
the beasts of the warp. More importantly, without the
guiding light of the Astronomican, humanity would
be plunged back into the darkness of the Age of Strife,
and would be consumed by their numerous enemies
in short order.
For those with the right talents or resonance, but who
lack the self mastery or strength of will required to
be trusted to operate independently, a process known
as soul-binding grants the psyker the protection they
cannot provide for themselves, while further optimizing
their talents to serve in the Adeptus Astra Telepathica.
These people lose their sight, their health, and/or a
portion of their sanity as their souls are infused with
a portion of the Emperor via the Astronomican, but
become very difficult to corrupt or otherwise taint as
a consequence. Interestingly, it is those whose eyes are
burned away that tend to be the most self-possessed
and powerful, perhaps because they endured their
immersion in the Astronomican’s light longer than
those whose minds or bodies were scourged by the
process. Additionally, the Astropaths gain tremendous
9
I mperial P rimer
10
telepathic, sensory, and divinatory abilities, and this
is what allows them to be the backbone of the entire
communication infrastructure of the Imperium. Of
course, this also makes them privy to secrets that no
other organization, short of the Inquisition, can see.
Finally, those that show the most strength, discipline,
control, devotion, and raw power are turned into the
Sanctioned Psykers of the Imperium. These psykers
are conditioned and trained to rely entirely on their
own ability, training, will, and faith to control and
wield their powers freely, and are the most powerful
weapons in the Imperium. These psykers lack the
additional protections of their lesser brethren, and
tend to endure a high fatality rate early in their careers
of service due to this lack of protection. With the
lack of external protections, comes immense freedom
and power in the development of their talents. The
most combat oriented, violent, or least trustworthy
sanctioned psykers tend to find themselves in the
tightly controlled Imperial Guard, where a single slip
will result in their commissar executing them before
initiating a disaster. On exceedingly rare occasion, if
the psyker is both young and of unparalleled strength,
stamina, and skill, they might even be inducted as
a librarian of one of the illustrious chapters of the
Adeptus Astartes. Those with the right personal
touches and perceptive talents might find themselves
assigned to some form of political or social support
role in the service of a major noble house (officially
only for those roles the house carries out on the
behalf of the Imperium, but personal relationships
and understandings are assumed to develop) or
a planetary governor. Those seen as the most
trustworthy, unconventional, or incisive of mind may
even be recruited as investigators or soldiers for the
Holy Ordos of the Inquisition.
There is, however, one group of psykers that never
see the inside of the black ships, and are held to a
wholly different set of rules. The Navis Nobilae are
noble bloodlines that carry the navigator gene. The
members of these houses are so critical to the function
of the Imperium, so limited in number, and nearly
impossible to recreate, that they literally exist above
the law. Only the Lords of Terra and the Inquisition
hold any direct authority over the Navis Nobilae, and
that authority extends only far enough to ensure that
the Navigator’s do not and can not act to significantly
destabilize the Imperium, commit acts of treason,
or fall to the corruption of Chaos. Beyond these
fundamental constraints, the Navigators are free to
do as they please. Were one to walk into a hive and
slaughter fifty thousand citizens for no reason, no
external authority would have the ability to censure
the culprit (though the houses themselves would do so
with extreme prejudice, due to the political costs and
dangers such an act would incite. The culprit would
be mysteriously struck dead before they could even
get the slaughter meaningfully underway). Even the
Inquisitorial Rosette does not give ultimate authority
in the face of the Navis Nobiliae, without being able
to show a good and justifiable cause for interference,
suspicious agents of the Inquisition must act with
exceptional care and stealth when looking in on the
secrets of the Navigator Houses.
Mutants
Mutants
D
“D
o not suffer the mutant to live” are the
words known as law to most Imperial
citizens.
Of course, were such a
simplistic and general rule followed literally, humanity
would be culled to a fraction of its current size and
all intersystem travel and communication would grind
to an immediate halt. Technically, more mutants are
allowed to live, even as full citizens, than are killed
under this ancient guideline (though many interpret
this phrase as divine and sacred law, it was a general
guideline for Imperial policy when the Emperor was
alive, due to the high occurrence of Chaos activity
and corruption among highly expressive or warped
mutants). It is notable that one of the greatest heroes
of the Imperium, Sanguinus the Blood Angel, Martyr
of the Emperor, first and best of all the loyal Primarchs,
was an extremely overt mutant himself, so it is clear the
Emperor did not have a universal hatred for mutation,
as he was second only to Horus in the Emperor’s favor,
before the Horus Heresy. The Navigator gene that is
so highly valued is an extreme and carefully cultivated
mutation, and to so much as attack a navigator without
proper (extreme) cause is a crime punishable by death.
Every world sees some unique genetic drift over their
millennia of development, and thus most would not
match whatever “pure” genetic standard was chosen.
So the question then is: what is, and more importantly
is not, a mutant? While psykers, navigators, and
various developmental and ethnic variations are all
technically brought about by genetic mutation, these
are classified as evolutionary developments, and
thus people possessing only these sorts of genetic
alterations are considered to be completely, purely
human. Somewhere beyond this normal distribution
of evolutionary changes are developments that move
so far from what is recognizable that the Imperium
cannot stomach granting the title of “human”, even
though the changes are consistent and evolutionary
(or devolutionary) in nature. These sub-species are
known as abhumans (abnormal humans), and retain
the basic fundamental rights of Imperial citizens,
but are held as second class citizens at best on most
worlds (so you can’t kill them or commit outright
atrocities against them, but the authorities are usually
not expected to protect them from any but the most
abhorrent of crimes).
Normally abhumans find themselves in specialist roles,
and are used almost exclusively for such purposes.
In general, while the death of an innocent human
Finally you have the various forms of true mutant.
Minor mutations are sometimes tolerated, especially
if they can be removed, replaced, or corrected in
some way (“Born with serpent’s eyes? Eh, we’ll slap
some cybers on him before anyone notices!”), or are
unobtrusive (such as the occasional night-walker
with the ability to see in absolute darkness). Such
individuals will still be watched closely for signs of
corruption, as corruption inevitably breeds mutation,
and mutation is frequently the only early indicator
the Imperium has to detect traitors in the service of
Chaos. Severe mutations are from one of two sources,
genetic damage caused by environmental or similar
forces, and warp corruption. Mutations coming from
genetic damage are largely similar to what was seen
during the Age of Terra, before the depredations of
Chaos were observed among humanity. However,
mutations coming from warp corruption tend to be
more fantastic, bizarre, functional, or impossible
in nature, depending on the source and the subject
involved.
How society actually handles mutants varies from
world to world as much as anything else, but
some patterns tend to hold to hold up in a general
sense. Hive worlds always have the largest mutant
population, both numerically and per-capita. The
abandoned, damaged, and toxic environments make
naturally occurring mutations much more common
amongst the unfortunates driven to such depths,
which then becomes a natural haven for mutants from
other sections of the hive, as they are likely resistant
to the environmental dangers, allowing them to both
be safe (well, safer) from any purges or pogroms, and
gives them a potential source of income by salvaging
materials and resources inaccessible to non-mutants.
Thus mutant shanty-towns become rather common in
the depths of the underhives.
On feral worlds, mutants tend to be short lived, but
those that do survive simply leave human society
behind, becoming hermits or falling in with a cult
or coven of Chaos in the wild. Archaic Imperial
and Shrine worlds tend to have the fewest mutants
amongst them, as they tend to be burned on sight,
regardless of who they are or what is wrong with them.
Death worlds tend to be the most blasé regarding
mutants, so long as they keep to themselves and don’t
cause trouble, in some cases a mutant may even find an
“outsider” role within the local culture. As most death
worlds are hotbeds of superstition combined with a
nonstop fight just to stay alive, few want to take the
spiritual or karmic risk of tangling with an otherwise
unaggressive and unobtrusive mutant unless they
have to. The void-born are host to some of the more
disturbing and unusual mutant colonies, in particular
some space hulks are home to nests of creatures so
warped and twisted that their human heritage is all
but unrecognizable.
Hive worlds, and feudal worlds relying on dangerous
manual labor, tend to have the least overtly hostile
policies towards mutants. However, these policies
tend to simply exploit the mutants to death rather than
execute them outright. For example, on the hellish
mining world of Sepheris Secundus, the mutants are
generally allowed to live, so long as they stick to the
uninhabitable and unstable toxic undermines. Trading
with these mutants is a crime, but this is only so more
bribe money can be sent up to the top by those people
trading medical supplies, food, and other goods to the
mutant population in exchange for the valuable ores
and chemicals that the mutants can reclaim from the
otherwise unreachable sections of the planet. Thus,
thanks to the ability to profit greatly by way of the
mutant’s work and suffering, the continued existence
of the mutants (as a whole, not individually) is quietly
protected by the nobles running the planet.
I mperial P rimer
is considered a tragedy, the death of an abhuman is
considered to be an unfortunate or distasteful turn of
events, and this is only in the more egalitarian worlds
where the labor pool has need for the specific traits of
the abhumans residing there. The two most common
forms of abhuman are ogrun, which is a catch-all
term for large, physically powerful human strains that
primarily developed on feral high-g worlds, and the
ratlings, small (and frequently nimble) humans from
feral or fallen worlds that required specialized traits to
safely maneuver through the environment and survive
the native dangers. Ogrun tend to find work in heavy
physical labor, while ratlings tend to end up in niche
industrial roles, or as scouts for the various military
factions of the Imperium.
Most hive worlds actually have a somewhat more
civilized mutant subculture in the lower and
underhives. These mutant colonies are frequently
officially zoned and the borders policed (to prevent
mutants from leaving or pure humans from entering),
and the mutants put to work in exchange for the
most basic of civil services (power, water, the ability
to develop the most basic of foodstuffs). Such
colonies tend to develop their own art, music, cants,
and social standards, in a few cases even having their
own unofficial police-force and/or lay-clergy. Life
in such colonies tends to be brief and brutal, but for
mutants in need of a sense of place, home, or society
without turning to chaos, some hives become a sort of
promised-land in mutant social mythology.
Legally, it is almost always considered a good thing
to kill a true mutant (rather than abhuman or offworld variant). In some cases bounties are offered
for mutant heads, and particularly hardened killers
make their living hunting the dregs of society in the
underhives. Usually the personal risks, low rewards,
and potential enemies made by killing a group of
mutants that are providing income to a more powerful
individual or organization, mean that such ventures
are infrequent and carried out exclusively by zealots
such as the Red Redemptionists. Some worlds do
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I mperial P rimer
offer a measure of legal protection to mutants that
obey the rules imposed on them and stay within the
labor colonies. Even then, the crime for grievously
injuring or killing such a mutant is usually at best a
on the level of a “lesser count of industrial sabotage”,
and more often simply a misdemeanor on par with
“destruction of property”.
Xenos
Xenos
M
M
uch as with mutants, the population holds
a stronger sentiment that the reality truly
supports regarding aliens. The Imperium’s
goal is not to exterminate all non-human sentient life.
The Imperium’s goal is to ensure that no xeno species
is able to taint or influence humanity or its culture, and
that Xenos of the galaxy know to remain out of Imperial
space. The only Imperial agents allowed to engage
xeno species in any manner but violence are specially
bonded emissaries and diplomats, Rogue Traders, and
the Inquisition. Aside from direct warfare or other
incursions on Imperial territory by xeno species, xeno
technology is considered to be the primary threat
posed by alien societies. To understand why this is
considered such a grave threat, one must recall the
Imperial beliefs regarding technology. All technology
is possessed of a soul, but only technology of the
Imperium carries a soul that is part of the Machine
God/Omnissiah/Emperor. To take up technology
of xeno origin is to commune with an alien soul and,
extraordinary situations aside, implies a rejection of
or contempt for the spirits of the Machine God and
thus the Emperor himself. Quite clearly this could
be taken as one of the more direct and contemptible
acts of heresy, hence the term “tech heresy” (which also
includes the construction of profane technology, such
as a sentient machine).
Technology and the machine spirit aside, there is a
deeper reason that the Emperor counseled his people
to distrust and reject the alien: he knew that with the
inclusion and acceptance of multiple alien cultures, it
would become next to impossible to see the influence
of chaos and the dark gods alongside them. Too
cosmopolitan a culture, and the influence of ideas
born of minds too distant from humanity, would
allow Chaos to become nearly invisible in society,
and thus bring about humanity’s downfall. Given
that the Emperor also understood the contributions
other species have made to the health and power of
the Chaos Gods (the Eldar in particular), he certainly
had evidence to support his suspicions.
12
Finally, there is the simple factor of various xeno
species’ own belligerence and aggression to consider.
The Orks are simply violence personified, they live to
fight and kill and die, with no option for negotiation,
sweeping though the galaxy like a plague. The Eldar,
despite having made more catastrophic mistakes (in
impact if not number) than possibly the rest of the starfaring races combined, remain aloof, contemptuous,
and self-important in their dealings with other races.
Their dark kin of Commorragh further complicate
matters; as they are not immediately distinguishable
from the rest of the Eldar, and their sadistic, souldrinking culture is not designed to make friends.
Finally the Tau Empire’s constant attempts to convert
human worlds to their philosophy of the “greater
good”, and eventually annex them, rather strongly
support the Imperiums views that, in general, any
alien is more likely murder and rob your worlds than
coexist peacefully.
The
Inquisition
The Inquisition
N
N
o one expects the Imperial Inquisition! (Not
even other Inquisitors.) The Inquisition’s
name, symbol, and authority (i.e. total) are
well known to every single citizen of the Imperium
that understands what “Imperium” really means.
A number of hivers have probably even seen their
world’s Inquisitorial headquarters (probably from a
considerable distance). Except for these ideas and a
generally mythical sense of dread at the very thought
of drawing Inquisitorial attention, little is known or
understood about what the Inquisition is or what it
does beyond “uncovering and destroying heresy, aliens,
and daemons”. Most citizens that have seen or met an
Inquisitorial agent have no idea who the person was,
and will never know that the Inquisition has touched
their lives.
Even most of those heretics and traitors who know
that the Inquisition would flay them alive for their
crimes do not expect to be confronted or noticed by
the Inquisition, regarding them as something of a
boogeyman. While the Inquisition has considerable
overt military and logistical resources, and the
authority to take control over anything else it needs
in the course of its duty, Inquisitors generally prefer
to operate in a subtle and clandestine manner. The
problem generally being that once the heretics know
the Inquisition is around, they vanish as thoroughly as
possible. Of course, this approach also supports the
public mystique surrounding their existence.
One of the great ironies of the Inquisition is that a
significant minority of their Inquisitors and agents are
borderline(or outright) heretics themselves. Some of
the most staggering achievements in daemonology,
sorcery, and tech-heresy have come not from the enemy,
but Inquisitors so driven to overcome their enemies
that they risk becoming the very thing they hunt. It is
generally the case that an upstanding citizen devoid of
doubt, suspicion, or a spark of rebellion will never be
approached for a position within the Inquisition, except
perhaps as a front line soldier among the Inquisitorial
storm troopers. So while dangerous radicals are a
When a citizen, even a high ranking official of
the Imperium, is presented with the Rosette of
Inquisitorial authority, the general reaction is shock
and panic followed by immediate and blind obedience.
This state may wear off, especially if the individual in
question sees things that raise questions or suspicions,
but the myth of the =][= is as powerful as the actual
authority they wield. A common misconception is
that there are only three divisions of the Inquisition.
The Ordo Xenos, Ordo Hereticus, and Ordo Malleus
are the primary, most powerful, and most numerous
of the Holy Ordos, but there are countless minor
orders with specific and critical responsibilities.
Some examples are the Ordo Dialogus, responsible
for dealing with language, codes, and ciphers, and
the Ordo Navis, an exceptionally secretive group
responsible for monitoring the Navis Nobilae for
Chaos, Xeno, or seditious influences.
It is important to remember that there are very few
full Inquisitors available to handle the massive scale of
responsibilities the Inquisition is required to handle.
Even a heavily populated hive world may have no
more than a half-dozen Inquisitors that pay any real
personal attention to the goings on there. Inquisitors
are first and foremost leaders and spymasters, relying
on a massive network of Interrogators (a sort of a
deputy Inquisitor, one can think of it as a mentoring
and training program), Acolytes, informants and
allies to keep them aware of any unusual changes
or threats. Thus, unless the situation is particularly
crucial, an Inquisitor is unlikely to be directly involved
in any investigation until the threat is both certain and
significant.
R
eligion
Religion
T
T
here are two faiths in the Imperium, and while
regarded by most as being separate from one
another, they are largely complementary despite
these perceptions to the contrary. The first, most
numerous, and most directly powerful, is the Imperial
Cult of the God Emperor of Mankind, directed and
managed by the Adeptus Ministorum, or Ecclesiarchy,
of the Imperium. The second, being a smaller but vital
part of Imperial society, is the Cult of the Machine
God, led by the Adeptus Mechanicus (also referred to
as the Cult Mechanicum, the Cult of the Omnissiah,
the Priesthood of Mars and, if the speaker is not
terribly respectful, cogboys/coggirls).
The Imperial Cult worships the Emperor directly
as a God, in a manner that is accessible to even the
simplest of abhumans, and is tolerant of a surprising
degree of heterodoxy, given its burning hatred of
all things heretical. While the Imperium is not
technically a theocracy (in fact, the Ecclesiarchy is
fairly limited in its direct power over Imperial Policy,
and has almost no military power), the symbol of
the church and the Imperium is identical: the Aquila
(or the double-headed eagle of the Imperium). The
faith of the Ecclesiarchy is a deeply layered and varied
entity. Nearly every world in the vast Empire of Man
follows a different doctrine and dogma from the
others, unified only by a subset of writings and core
principals to direct them along the fine line between
heterodoxy and heresy. On the surface, the differences
are generally minor, as the common citizen knows
little of the finer points of their faith, and understands
even less. For most people, you know your place, you
obey, you pray, you serve, and you reject and report
anything that smacks of heresy. Little thought is
required from most citizens; the Emperor provides,
the Emperor protects, and the Emperor’s righteous
wrath will certainly consume his enemies.
I mperial P rimer
minority, independent thinkers that failed to properly
fit into Imperial society are the norm, rather than an
exceptional case.
For those with a more academic or theological leaning,
things are considerably more complex. The doctrine
of the Imperial Cult is, from a historical perspective,
a mercurial thing. Every few centuries shifts in the
accepted range of heterodoxy occur, and accepted
sects find themselves having to adapt or risk becoming
heretics themselves. Purges are almost never instigated
by simple doctrinal alterations, these shifts are usually
triggered when a sect is discovered to have become
vulnerable to chaos or other heretical influences. After
being purged, the factors that are believed to have
led to that vulnerability are excised from acceptable
heterodoxy. A recent example of such an event would
be the corruption, purgation, and denouncement of
the Astral Knives death cult. After their corruption
was discovered, it was concluded that their methods
of worship were too easily touched by chaos, and their
praxis was thus proscribed (though not declared to be
inherently heretical).
The consequence is that the doctrine of the Imperial
Cult becomes more and more labyrinthine the more
closely it is analyzed. Worse still for any truth-seeker,
directly conflicting but accepted points of doctrine are
not simply extant, but common. Only when a student
of Imperial theology brings everything together does
the reason for this become clear; what is acceptable
has nothing to do with what is true, so long as what
is true is held faithfully and what is accepted is not
dangerous. In this, one comes full circle; the details of
the Emperor’s divinity and will are a matter of open
debate, but his divinity, his protection of humanity,
and his battle against the ruinous powers of Chaos are
not.
The Cult of the Machine God, on the other hand,
is largely the opposite. Aside from rare changes in
the determination of what technology is and is not
heretical, their doctrine has barely changed since the
upheavals that began when the Emperor stepped foot
13
I mperial P rimer
on Mars over ten thousand years ago to be declared
the Omnissiah of the Machine God, and which ended
a few centuries following his near/partial-death at the
hands of his favored son Horus. Like the Imperial
Cult, the Cult of the Machine God worships the
Emperor. However, they believe that the Emperor is
“merely” the physical manifestation of the Machine
God/Embodiment of all Knowledge and Wisdom,
referring to him as the Omnissiah. While this may
seem bizarre and incomprehensible to most Imperial
citizens, an understanding of the early history of the
Imperium makes this much more understandable.
The Priesthood of Mars has an animistic view of
machines, believing that all machines of Imperial origin
hold a spirit that is a reflection of the Machine God,
and thus the Emperor (though the exact structure of
this trinity is one of the few seriously debated points
of doctrine among the tech-priests). While they hold
control over nearly all of the technological secrets of
Imperial technology, including any serious maintenance
or production, it is all steeped in complex religious
ritual and prayer. Aside from a handful of free-thinkers
and the higher ranking Magos of the Mechanicum,
the Tech-Priest’s knowledge of technology is largely
rote, and lacks an underlying understanding of why
the technology they care for and create works the
way it does. The priesthood, especially in the many
millennia following the Emperor’s internment in the
Golden Throne of Terra, generally seeks to become as
much like the machines they worship as they can be.
With a few exceptions (such as those in the Genetor
sect), one can usually tell how advanced a given techpriest is within the order by how little of their organic
body remains.
Language
Language
T
T
here are two official languages of the Imperium.
The first and most common language is Low
Gothic. Low Gothic is the tongue spoken
by nearly every single member of the Imperium,
excepting only the farthest backwater worlds, and
most uncivilized of feral planets. It is borne of an
ancient pidgin of English, European and Pacific
languages which developed over many centuries in the
American/Pacific region, with a large influence from
various Slavic, Chinese, and Hindi language families.
It has moved so far beyond its roots however, that only
an unparalleled master of linguistics would be able to
see the connections. It is represented in English (or
the language spoken by the author/player).
14
The second, far less common language is High
Gothic. High Gothic is the hieratic tongue of the
Ecclesiarchy and the Imperium, and supposedly forms
the root structure of the secret Binaric language of the
Mechanicum, though they refuse to confirm or deny
this theory. It is rarely used for conversation (though
frequently used in conversation), and makes a poor
cipher, but it is considered holy. It is used for official
titles (such as Adeptus Administratum) and many of
the official prayers of the Ecclesiarchy, in addition to
the lay prayers taught to non-members by the Cult
Mechanicum (such as the Litany of the Lasgun or the
Litany of Loading). High Gothic was the language
that Low Gothic split off of to become, before the
influence of additional dialects was introduced. High
Gothic was retained due to the written materials
that survived from the Dark Age of Technology, and
during the Imperium’s formative years was also simply
referred to as “Tech”. High Gothic is represented in
(a very bastardized form of ) Latin, but has no actual
connection to the language within the setting.
In addition, every world has its own dialect of Low
Gothic, some more deviant from the “official” version
than others. Hive worlds and the more functional
Imperial worlds tend to be mostly identical to the
core language, but loaded with (generally optional)
replacement words and slang that developed over
centuries of independent growth and development.
Consequently, most Hivers can switch to the “true”
version of Low Gothic so long as they are being careful
not to slip into old habits, while civilized imperials
worlders will only fall back to their native dialect when
amongst their own. Feral worlders tend to have the
most trouble losing their “native touch” and accent, as
they tend to come from worlds that have fallen the
farthest from proper Imperial society. The void born,
however, usually have a cant used exclusively amongst
the people of their ship or fleet, but would never
consider speaking it to an outsider, and thus tend to
speak “true” Low Gothic with fluency and without
(much) accent.
Finally there is the secret tongue of the Tech-Priests,
Binaric. It is not simply a string of binary, despite its
name, and is regarded as the most complicated true
language in the Imperium (there are innumerable
other secret tongues in use, but they are rarely
anything but an impenetrable cant or cipher of Low
Gothic). In fact, the Inquisition has been trying to
crack Binaric for centuries (longer really, ever since the
inception of the Ordo Dialogus, but they don’t like
to admit that), to no measurable success. The techpriests do not seem to find this pursuit to be a threat,
in fact it seems to be a source of amusement to the
younger (less dispassionate) members of the Martian
priesthood, who have been known to have long,
drawn out conversations in Binaric in front of such an
investigator, just to watch their frustration build.
His
tory
History
F
F
or an outsider looking in, the Imperium can
seem nearly incomprehensible and ridiculous
in a broad number of ways. If one were looking
We will start with the current era (current for the
players, not the characters), or “The Age of Terra” by
Imperial standards. From the modern day of M3,
until M15, we progressed through a series of rises and
falls that are no longer well documented anywhere in
the Imperial records. Wars were fought, the system
was colonized to some degree (only Mars was fully
terraformed, though it remained a cold desert world
through most of its history), stations and colonies
were built and lost... then rebuilt again. Technology
was developed, manufactured, stolen, and forgotten
only to be rediscovered or developed again decades,
centuries, or millennia later. Through this time
humanity had no direct contact with other species,
and the only extra-solar colonies were developed
through the use of generation ships (referred to as
Ohnyl Cylinders). Given the limits of communication
and travel during this period of human history, once
these vessels had travelled a sufficient distance, their
fates would remain unknown for untold millennia,
and in some cases forever.
The Dark Age of Technology is considered to have
begun in M15, when the focus turned from the solar
system to the galaxy as a whole, though a safe means
of FTL travel (effective, not literal) was not developed
until M18. Nearby colonies were developed more
aggressively, as colony ships were sent to systems within
10 generations travel of Terra, until the development
of the Warp Drive and the Geller Field (it should be
noted that warp travel was likely developed a few times
previous to this age, but limited human understanding
of the warp, and the lack of a Geller field, may have
been the cause of more than one human fall from
progress). It was also during this time that artificial (or
abominable, depending on your reference) intelligence
was brought into widespread and common use,
later resulting in yet another disastrous conflict for
humanity when the “Iron Men” rose up against their
masters (resulting in a severe ban on such technology
that persists more than 10,000 years later). This age
is referred to as a “Dark Age” due to what is believed
to be humanity’s lack of ethics, morality, or wisdom in
favor of the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake.
For all humanity has accomplished since this time,
they have never regained the heights of technological
acumen achieved during this era. Perhaps not
coincidentally, it was around the time of the Warp
Drive and Geller Field’s development that Psykers
began to appear in much larger numbers than (is
suspected to have) existed previously, and became
a scientifically acknowledged fact. It was shortly
after these discoveries that the first Xeno species
were encountered (most likely the Orks, and to a
very limited extent some Eldar) and war erupted
sporadically throughout the age. It was not until M22
that peace would be brokered with more than a dozen
Xeno species (though not the Orks, the closest word
to “peace” they have roughly translates to “timeout” or
“break”, and the only Eldar that would have considered
peace at that time would have been Exodites) ,
coinciding with the development or discovery of the
Navigator Gene that gave rise to the Navis Nobilae.
With these navigators the ships of humanity could
travel significantly farther and faster than ever before.
Thus began the Golden Age of Man. For three
thousand years humans spread throughout the galaxy
in relative peace, security, and power. There was little
reason to believe that the ignorance and darkness of
their past would ever touch humanity again.
I mperial P rimer
for comedy, rather than understanding, they could
fairly say the Imperium is ruled by a comatose hybrid
of Zombie Jesus and the Battle Pope... though this
would, of course, entirely miss the point. One must
understand the history of humanity in the 41st
millennium for the story of where they are now to
make sense. While much of what is below remains
unknown even to most scholars of Imperial and Terran
history, it is required for most people looking from the
outside-in to understand the people and motivations
of the Imperium. While some portions may seem
bulky, the most attention and time was devoted to the
periods of the Horus Heresy, and the Age of Apostasy,
because of their lasting impact on the perspective and
culture of humanity.
Of course that meant everything was to change, and it
did so practically overnight. In M25 the warp suddenly
erupted in the most horrific storm ever known before
or since; the Eye of Terror opened in the “North by
Northwest” region of the galaxy, consuming every star
system in its expanse, and plunging the populations
there into the warp unprotected, en mass. The storm
persisted for nearly five millennia, with barely a break
for even a single ship to slip through. Every Terran
colony was cut off, left to fend for itself without
the hope of trade, supply, or support. Many worlds
died due to incomplete infrastructures, collapsed
environments, and the least fortunate to Ork raiders
(who have never been terribly troubled by the vagaries
of the warp). Many fell to savagery and barbarism,
with stories of Terra falling into legends, or forgotten
completely. (Unknown to all but the most advanced
students of the Warp and the lore of Chaos, this storm
was the birthing cry of the Chaos God Slaanesh, and
the consequent death-knell of the Eldar homeworld
and core systems).
Back in the Sol system, Mars and Terra had severe
problems of their own. With the collapse of the human
intersystem infrastructure, crucial supply lines for their
native system were lost. Mars’ carefully maintained
terraforming began to collapse, while the people of
Terra balkanized into a number of small factions,
quickly turning on one another due to conflicts over
severely limited resources. It took little time for the
Terrans to bomb each other back a few ages worth of
development, though as a side “benefit” they whittled
their own numbers down to a manageable level equally
fast. Meanwhile, a new religion was born on the dying
15
I mperial P rimer
16
world of Mars. As people took shelter in the few
facilities capable of supporting life, those individuals
that could keep the machines providing food, water,
and air running became the only people that mattered,
and all else were either their followers keeping them
supplied and supported, or their enemies trying to
steal or usurp what they could not create or maintain
themselves.
Over the centuries these engineers became holy figures,
they were the life givers and preservers of their world,
and the technology under their care became holy as
well. In time, a prophesy of a herald of the Machine
God descending from the heavens, an Omnissiah that
would bear a mastery of technology that could only
be divine, was born amongst this new Priesthood
of Mars. Late in the age of strife, before the rise of
the Emperor, the newly founded Mechanicum began
sending colony ships with complete complements
of troops, titans, equipment, and priests to distant
worlds whenever the storms calmed enough to
provide a chance of travel, and while many were lost
the survivors gave birth to the original forge worlds,
though they would not be reunited with Mars until
the time of the Great Crusade (and some not until
well after). At the time, the destruction and barbarism
of Terra was regarded as repulsive to the priesthood,
and aside from occasional covert raids to reclaim lost
technology, Terra was effectively ignored.
After some three thousand years of techno-barbarian
tribal warfare and internecine conflict, a powerful
psyker and scientist emerged on Terra. This man
quickly became a powerful warlord and began a
campaign to unite Terra under his rule, a campaign
now known as the Unification Wars. The campaign
was bloody, long, and brutal, but the planet was
brought to heel and the Imperium of Man was born.
It took some time for the newly crowned Emperor
of Terra to consolidate his power, and the handful of
resources that were still intact, after three millennia
of constant war. Once Terra was properly united
and productive under his banner, the Emperor’s
first stop was Mars. To this day, some (borderline
heretical) members of the Adeptus Mechanicus still
question the unusually well orchestrated arrival of the
Emperor, and the precise manner in which his descent
to Mars matched the prophesy of the Omnissiah.
However, most adherents simply take the prophesy’s
precise accuracy as a matter of course for the coldly
logical spirituality of the Mechanicum. Regardless,
with the spiritual capital acquired by fulfilling the
Mechanicum’s prophesy, and thus claiming the mantle
of Omnissiah, it was a comparably small matter to
bring the Mechanicum into the Imperium. There was
a brief civil uprising (too minor to be called a war)
amongst the Mechanicum, as a few refused to accept
the Emperor as their messianic figure, but they were
small in number and quickly put down.
Of note in this partnership however, was the
Mechanicum’s relative independence and autonomy
under their alliance with the Imperium. The reason for
this was twofold; first there was the simple need that
Terra had for the technology of the Mechanicum, the
Great Crusade could never have happened without the
steadfast support of the Martian production facilities.
Second, the religious nature of the Mechanicum, no
matter how empirical and rational in practice, was not
compatible with the militant-fundamentalist atheism
of the Imperial Truth. By allowing the Mechanicum
to operate as an autonomous vassal state, the natural
philosophical and cultural conflicts were kept to a
relative minimum. While it is not exactly a matter of
forbidden knowledge, very few citizens of the Imperium
in the 41st millennium are aware of just how severely
the Emperor renounced his own divinity. During his
active rule, some cases of religious observance were
considered a criminal act when performed by an
official of the Imperium.
After peacefully reuniting with the Saturnine Fleet, a
militaristic and nomadic band of void-born inhabiting
the stations and ships beyond the Belt, the Sol system
was fully united and the warp storms had abated.
With the ability to reach out to the lost colonies of
humanity, the Imperium began to grow once again. In
preparation for his Great Crusade to unite humanity
across the Galaxy under a single banner, the Emperor
“birthed” 20 sons using technology he had, at least
as theory goes, improved on from the Dark Age of
Technology. These sons were modified and enhanced
clones of the Emperor, though his psychic abilities
were not retained (with the exception of Magnus the
Red), at least not directly, they were nothing less than
demigods in the more conventional power they gained
from their sublimated psychic potential. Having
already noticed the Emperor’s actions, the ruinous
powers of Chaos kidnapped and scattered his progeny
across the galaxy. Though it may seem odd that these
Primarchs always landed with one of the lost human
colonies, it would later be seen just why this had
played out in such a seemingly convenient manner.
Each of these immortal men rose to positions of
power on their adopted homeworlds, simply by virtue
of the tremendous power and native intellect they
each wielded.
Knowing most of his sons were alive and somewhere
amongst the lost colonies, the Emperor cast his
awareness out across the galaxy to track them down.
In a matter of just a few centuries the Emperor
and his eighteen surviving immortal progeny were
reunited, during which the Adeptus Astartes were
developed. The Astartes, commonly referred to
simply as Space Marines, were to the Primarchs what
the Primarchs were to the Emperor. While not true
clones themselves, the very best warriors amongst
humanity were raised up and implanted with the “gene
seed”, a genetic derivative of one of the Primarchs.
This seeding, along with a number of implants grown
After a few centuries of relentless expansion, worlds
that had been hastily brought to heel under imperial
rule began to rebel, and the legions found themselves
returning to old battlegrounds just to reclaim worlds
they had recently won. It was in the midst of this
conflict that the final seeds of Chaos’ plans were sown.
While the Emperor was all too aware of the ruinous
powers of Chaos and their intentions for humanity,
and all sentient life for that matter, even his own sons
had only the vaguest inkling of the threat posed by
the daemons of the warp and their foul gods. All his
sons save two: Magnus the Red, and Lorgar of the
Word Bearers. Magnus had come to this awareness
on his own, and until forced by the Emperor to turn
away, he used this knowledge to try and protect the
Imperium. Lorgar, on the other hand, had received
this knowledge in a more direct manner. Lorgar was a
man of great faith, and had foretold the arrival of the
Emperor in religious prophesy. When the Emperor
finally arrived, a religious following awaited him, the
Primarch and his followers worshiped him as a god
made flesh. While Lorgar and his followers purged all
religious icons and texts they found in the course of
their part of the Great Crusade, they simply replaced
them with works to worship the Emperor. Incensed at
both Lorgar’s lack of progress and religious zeal in the
face of the Imperial Truth, the Emperor admonished
Lorgar personally, reprimanding him harshly for
turning to the “false light of religion”. Lorgar took
this admonishment poorly, and spent a month deep in
mourning. It was during this period that his second
in command and closest friend, Kor Phaeron, told
him of gods that were both real and welcoming of
such zeal. As the weeks passed, Kor Phaeron turned
Lorgar to the following of the Chaos gods, giving birth
to the worship of Chaos Undivided. This purpose, it
would eventually be discovered, was the true reason
for the Primarchs’ survival and eventual reunification...
all planned by the gods of the warp (well, Tzeentch
mostly) for thousands of years leading up to that
moment. Worse still, the ruinous powers of Chaos
were far from done.
Initially it appeared that the Word Bearers had taken
the Emperor’s directives to heart, tearing down all
religious trappings of the Emperor and aggressively
conquering world after world in the name of the
Imperium. All while Kor Phaeron, now master of
the faith, had been entrusted by Lorgar to convert the
entire Word Bearer legion to the worship of Chaos
Undivided, which he did with remarkable swiftness.
Once the legion was united under Chaos Undivided,
they set their sights on the rest of the Primarchs and
their legions. First and foremost, they knew they
had to corrupt the newly anointed Warmaster of the
Great Crusade, Horus, the first and favored son of
the Emperor. When the Emperor turned command
of the crusade over to Horus, he withdrew to Terra
to continue contemplating his eternal battle against
the Chaos Gods, and begin work on his masterstroke
against them, the Golden Throne project. Deprived
of any deeper knowledge of their father’s motivations,
his newly reunited sons felt lessened and slighted
by their father’s departure, and existing rivalries
intensified without his guiding hand holding his sons
together. Feeling that the time was finally right, the
Word Bearers made their move. In a series of traps
and manipulations the agents of the Word Bearers
arranged for Horus to become mortally wounded,
and provided the care required to return him from
the brink of death, so as to turn him from his father
while he was weak of body, mind, and spirit. Once
the seed of corruption and rebellion was planted in
Horus’ heart, it was just a matter of time before he
was able, with the help of Chaos’ manipulations and
Word Bearer support, to turn six of his brothers to his
side against their father (the final two, Magnus and
Alpharius, joined later due to events beyond Horus’
influence).
Horus revealed his treachery in the virus bombing of
the rebel world of Istvaan III. While Istvaan III was
certainly not a friend of the Imperium, Horus used
the attack on the rebel planet as an opportunity to
purge the loyalists from the ranks of his traitor legions.
Waiting until the attack was well underway, and all
suspected loyalists were on site, the virus bombing
to purge Istvaan III of all life began and 12 billion
souls were consigned to the warp. Thankfully for the
Imperium, a small band of loyalists escaped the purge,
and fled to warn Terra of the Warmaster’s betrayal.
The first battle of the Heresy would also reveal the
full extent of the corruption; the Emperor ordered a
coordinated assault between seven legions against his
traitorous son on the planet of Istvaan V, but four of
those legions had already turned to Horus’ side. The
resulting bloodbath ended with the death of Ferrus
Manus, the loyalist Primarch of the Iron Hands legion,
and the consequent ascension of the traitor Fulgrim,
I mperial P rimer
from the initiate’s own tissues, made the once mortal
warriors into superhuman soldiers by rewriting their
genetic makeup to echo their parent Primarch. Once
the Emperor had united his sons, and had the Astartes
legions that each commanded by his side, the Great
Crusade was fully underway. System after system was
reabsorbed into the Imperium, some welcoming their
Terran ancestors with open arms as their rightful rulers,
others negotiating a vassal relationship (though over
generations their autonomy was skillfully and subtly
eroded away to nothing), and a remarkable handful
choosing to fight for their independence. Few of these
resistant cultures were able to mount a defense worth
noting, the power of the Astartes with the technology
of the Mechanicum making any such gestures generally
futile. Some however, due to holding an STC template
of particular power, or simply due to having become
too distant from the human ideal for reabsorbtion
to be possible, were events worthy of marking in the
Imperium’s history by the remembrancers (artists,
writers, and the like, employed by the Imperium for
both domestic propaganda and historical recording).
17
I mperial P rimer
of the Emperor’s Children legion, to Daemonprince.
Corax, Primarch of the Raven Guard, was nearly
killed and barely escaped the trap with a handful of
his legion’s survivors, while Vulcan of the Salamander
legion was missing in action. Only six Primarchs and
their legions remained to resist Horus. The Emperor
had nearly done Horus’ work for him with Magnus,
turning the Sorcerer Primarch of Prospero to Horus’
banner by denouncing his methods and claiming
Magnus had already fallen to Chaos (which given
that Magnus’ haste, along with the interference of
Tzeentch, had caused him to inadvertently unleash
a host of daemons into the Imperial Palace, was an
understandable belief ). Alpharius, on the other hand,
simply appeared without explanation and immediately
swore to end the Imperium’s rule at Horus’ side. So
with the nine traitor legions strong and united, they
descended on Terra to end the conflict with the death
of their father. Less than 30 days passed before the
system defenses had fallen, and the surviving loyalists
held only the Imperial Palace by the 55th day of
Horus’ assault on the system. It was at this stage that
the battle that would define the next ten thousand
years of human history began to unfold.
Horus learned of incoming reinforcements from
the loyalist legions that had been kept bogged down
and away from Terra during the assault, and made a
desperate bid to end the conflict before his advantage
was stripped from him. Lowering the shields
protecting his barge, Horus lured the Emperor into
a personal confrontation. The Emperor teleported
himself, Sanguinius, and Rogal Dorn, along with
a contingent of Astartes and Custodes to the barge,
but they were scattered in the transfer (a common
problem in the ever unreliable case of teleportation).
Sanguinius was the first to fall to Horus, though it is
said that through the sacrifice of the martyred Blood
Angel, the Emperor was able to overcome his first son,
despite the powers of the ruinous powers backing
him. Unfortunately, the Emperor’s body was crippled
by the injuries he sustained, and though rescued from
the Warmaster’s barge by Rogal Dorn, it was clear
that the damage was irreparable. With little time
left to preserve his species from the depredations of
Chaos, the Emperor instructed Dorn to reconfigure
the Golden Throne, and had himself interred within
it, consigning himself to an endless state of agonizing
undeath.
18
The impact of this event was both immediate and
far-reaching, as the Emperor was vastly reduced in
function once placed within the Golden Throne.
Though the device was redesigned to keep every
remaining salvageable cell of the Emperor’s body alive
indefinitely, his ability to communicate and participate
actively in the management of his Imperium was all
but gone. His spirit and his will were unbroken,
however, and his tie to the Astronomican made
even stronger through his bond to the throne (they
are effectively in a symbiotic relationship, so deeply
intertwined over the years that the Emperor and the
Astronomican are now effectively one and the same).
His will is the bulwark protecting humanity from
the warp and the ruinous powers, and should he ever
relent the Astronomican will be snuffed out, leaving
humanity unprotected and without guidance. It is said
that the Emperor still guides the Lords of Terra when
matters of the materium are dire enough to draw his
attention, and that he guides all humanity through the
readings of the Emperor’s Tarot. As the centuries and
millennia passed, the Emperor’s awareness become
more removed and abstract, eventually having no clear
connection to the world his body inhabited.
Marked by the death of the Warmaster and the
breaking of Chaos’ forces against Terra, the era of the
Great Crusade gave way to the Great Scouring. With
the Emperor confined to the Golden Throne and the
Imperium effectively leaderless, the forces of Chaos and
other enemies of humanity laid waste to the worlds left
sparsely defended in the wake of the Horus Heresy. In
time the forces of the Imperium rallied and were able
to push back against their enemies, though the cost
in lives and equipment was staggering. The eventual
emergence and survival of the Imperium through the
Great Scouring and into the Age of Rebirth can be
largely attributed to the leadership of the Primarch
Roboute Guilliman, and the strength of his legion.
Horus had successfully kept Guilliman’s legion tied
up in conflicts far from Terra, which left them strong
and numerous enough to defend the Imperium
afterwards. It took centuries of costly warfare, but in
time the tactics of Guilliman were successfully used to
reclaim the territories that still existed and drive the
forces of Chaos into the Eye of Terror. By the end of
the Age of Rebirth, the belief that the Emperor was a
divine entity had become accepted as fact throughout
the Imperium, and even many of the Lords of Terra
were openly affiliated with the Imperial Cult. In M32,
the Golden Age of the Imperium began with the
acceptance of the Imperial faith as the official doctrine
of the Imperium. It was also at this time, perhaps due
to their inability to accept life within an Imperium so
vastly different from the empire they had fought for,
that the remaining Primarchs left known space in
search for their own answers.
The Golden Age of the Imperium lasted for nearly four
thousand years as Astropathic Choirs were established
throughout the known regions of the galaxy and
previously lost STCs from Dark Age of Technology
were discovered as the Imperium began to return to its
former size and power. This period is remembered as
a Golden Age primarily due to the steady growth and
lack of internal upheavals accompanying the growth
and development of the Imperial Faith. Despite
the repeated efforts of Warmaster Abaddon and his
first four “Black Crusades”, the end of the Golden
Age would come from within rather than from any
external threat. As the Ecclesiarchy grew in power
and influence following the official acceptance of the
Finally, in M36 the Age of Apostasy was marked
by the rise of Goge Vandire, 361st High Lord of
the Administratum, and the eruption of the most
powerful warp storms seen since the Age of Strife.
The Ecclesiarchy moved to consolidate their power
on what worlds they could still reach, while the other
planets fell to the depredations of Ork Waaaaghs!
(Or is that Waaagh!s? Regardless, the exclamation
point is considered to be part of the proper spelling,
at least as far as something as precise as spelling can
be applied to the Orkish kulture.), chaos raiders from
the Eye of Terror, and Genestealer cults (though it
would thankfully be five thousand more years before
an actual hive fleet entered the galaxy). In the midst
of such upheaval the Imperial faith balkanized into
numerous small sub-cults on the worlds not directly
controlled by the Ecclesiarchy, each having their
own varied interpretations of the Emperor’s divinity
and will. These cults denounced the excesses of the
Ecclesiarchy, and some worlds erupted into civilreligious wars over such resentments. Vandire’s rise to
power in the Adeptus Terra and the Administratum
coincided with this weakening of the Ecclesiarchy. So,
once he reached the position of High Lord, he moved
to take over the Ecclesiarchy as well, successfully
deposing the Ecclesiarch Paulis III (which he had
been subtly ensuring would rise to Ecclesiarch, as he
was incompetent and easily manipulated into “forcing”
Vandire’s hand) in a military coup, and executed every
Terran who stood against him as heretics. A handful
escaped on a vessel headed back to the planet Ophelia
VII, though it was consumed in a warp storm, further
validating Vandire’s power grab. Vandire’s insane and
violent rule is remembered as the Reign of Blood,
where hive worlds were bombarded into oblivion,
entire populations were enslaved, and civilizations
were wiped out in progressively more “artistic” ways,
not for showing resistance or any related failing, but
simply as a means for Vandire to mark his own history
and express his absolute power. Vandire took up
public displays of torture as a hobby, and eventually
descended into a deep schizophrenia that he insisted
was driven by the divine guidance of the Emperor
(which was of course false… he was just brilliant,
charismatic, and completely insane).
I mperial P rimer
Imperial Faith, the Administratum became incensed
at their loss of control to the Ministorum (the feud
between them would last through to the current day,
and almost certainly beyond). From M34 through M35
the Ecclesiarchy became fat and complacent on the
tithes paid to them, consequently electing a succession
of weak, ineffectual, and mildly corrupt Ecclesiarchs.
Seizing the opportunity, the Administratum was able
to clamp down on the excesses of the Ministorum
and regain a significant portion of their former
power. In a bid to escape the growing influence of
the Administratum, the Ecclesiarchy relocated their
base of power to Ophelia VII in the Segmentum
Tempestus. The Ecclesiarchy leveraged this distance,
and the Administratum’s inability to adapt quickly,
to raise huge tithes and begin assembling a military
on par with the Imperial Guard, to be known as the
Templar Frateris. Only three centuries later the newly
elected Ecclesiarch, Gregor XI, decreed that the cult
would return to Terra. This drained their financial
reserves yet again, resulting in yet higher tithes.
“Coincidentally”, when he began to push for radical
changes within the Imperial Faith, he died of food
poisoning before any could be enacted. Once back on
Terra with their own military power, the Ecclesiarchy
felt comfortable raising tithes further still, to pay for
more and more elaborate and larger palaces, statues,
and the like. Finally, many worlds could take no more
and revolted. Quietly backed by the Administratum,
worlds refused to pay the exorbitant tithes and poured
the funds into their PDFs (Planetary Defense Forces),
rather than be bankrupted by the Ecclesiarchy’s greed.
The church’s response was swift and violent, as their
military might was used to bring these rebellious
worlds back into submission. Every governor and
planetary official who resisted the demands of the
church were executed as heretics, while any that were
out of immediate reach were visited by the church’s
agents from the Collegium Assassinorum. Despite
the revolts, or perhaps as a reaction to them, the
Ecclesiarchy only became more ostentatious.
Perhaps his deepest violation of the faith, and most
historically relevant, was his laying claim to an order
calling themselves the “Daughters of the Emperor”, a
small, all-female, monastic, warrior-cult that devoted
themselves to inner purity, and existed outside the
guidance of any other religious authority. Using a
Rosarius field generator (a semi-secret Ecclesiarchal
device that looks like a normal holy symbol of the
Emperor, but contains a powerful protective field
generator), he was able to trick the Daughters
into believing that he was divinely protected and
held a sacred mandate. The Daughters lacked the
technological brilliance required to recognize the
“divine intervention” for what it was, and immediately
converted to the slavish devotion of Vandire.
He renamed the Daughters the Brides of the Emperor,
and used them as bodyguards, assassins, personal
servants, and concubines. After 70 years of hellish
rule, Vandire’s madness finally began to cripple him.
For all the wonders Vandire ordered constructed and
maintained on worlds throughout the Imperium, his
own Terran Palaces fell into filthy disrepair. Vermin,
filth, and structural collapse became the norm in his
home palace, while his body was wracked with drugs,
disease, and wasting due to his increasing inability to
function (think of a particularly evil Howard Hughes
in his later years). He was still able to direct his
agents to enact his insane plans, however, regardless
of the failings he faced in his personal life. It was at
this time that, in the year 266.M36, it is believed that
the Emperor finally moved to correct the direction
of His Imperium. A rebellious religious leader
named Sebastian Thor denounced the Ecclesiarch
19
I mperial P rimer
20
and High Lord as a traitor to humanity, then formed
and led The Confederation of Light to liberate eighty
planets from the Ecclesiarchy’s control within a mere
three months (an achievement that is particularly
unprecedented due to the unprecedented cooperation
of warp currents Thor enjoyed throughout his
campaign). When Vandire ordered a strike team to
burn Thor’s homeworld of Dimmamar to cinders,
the fleet was ripped apart by a freak warp storm
immediately after jumping from their staging point
in the Clax system. What the few accounts received
from the fleet reported, before contact was lost, sealed
the rebellion’s faith in Thor; the fleet’s ships, and the
soldiers aboard them, were shredded by arcs of white
light that somehow bypassed the Geller fields entirely.
Clax remains cut off from the galaxy to this day, the
Storm of the Emperor’s Wrath a permanent reminder
to those who would dare to profane His Imperium.
Following the Advent of the Storm, the entire
Segmentum Obscurus rallied to Thor’s banner,
rebelling against the corrupt Ecclesiarchy. Thor’s fleet
progressed towards Terra, and every world he visited
fell to his force of personality and the conviction of
his faith, in many cases without so much as a warning
shot fired. Despite the warp storms still raging across
the galaxy, Thor’s fleet was able to pass quickly and
without incident. The Navis Nobilae still call him
Abstracta Preomnis, Master of the Warp. Worse still
for Vandire was the return of the Astartes chapters
and the Mechanicum forge worlds that had been
keeping out of the conflict because they were not yet
united and were unwilling to commit to military action
against Terra unilaterally. They held to a central faith
in the Emperor, but thought little of Vandire’s corrupt
empire or the pathetic Ecclesiarchy that had preceded
him. With the arrival of the Confederation of Light,
all of that changed. As one they declared their support
for Thor’s forces against Vandire, calling for the High
Lords of Terra to execute Vandire as a traitor or be
judged as traitors themselves.
Though already megalomaniacal, Vandire’s madness
had robbed him of any rational self-awareness, he
now believed he truly was invincible and held a divine
mandate from the Emperor. So after he dissolved the
Council of High Lords he foolishly attempted to set
what remained of the Templar Frateris against the
Space Marines and Adeptus Mechanicus, an order his
officers quite reasonably refused to obey. Even after a
series of executions for treason and heresy, most of the
replacement officers only went so far as to lead their
forces to the targets they were given, but would not
engage (mainly due to the fact that they would have
torn to shreds without so much as bloodying their
target’s nose, rather than out of any higher principals).
Ignoring the few, admittedly pathetic, actual attacks
suffered from the Templars, the Astartes chapters and
the Mechanicum besieged Terra. The similarity to the
events of the Horus Heresy was not lost on anyone,
but now it was the Brides of the Emperor defending
the palace from the loyal Astartes and Mechanicum
forces. Though for all the forces against him it
would turn out that Vandire’s fall would come from
within, before the siege could even be said to have
truly begun. The Adeptus Custodes (the Emperor’s
personal guard, created before the Astartes with
similar technology, few details of their creation are
known except that none are psykers, and that they
are each more powerful than any single Astartes) had
withdrawn from the events surrounding Vandire,
70 years being a brief hiccup to these immortal
guardians. However, when the siege of Terra began,
they were forced to act. Seeing Vandire for the despot
that he was, the Custodes secretly coordinated with
the chapter masters of the Astartes and worked to
end the conflict from within the Imperial palace.
Instead of simply going to war with the Brides in an
assassination attempt, the Centurion and commander
of the Custodes engaged Alicia Dominica, the leader
of the Brides, diplomatically. Their discussion would
ultimately prove fruitless, until he offered to leave
his men as hostages and take Dominica before the
Emperor himself. What happened in that meeting is
unknown, but immediately after the Brides returned
their order’s name to the Daughters of the Emperor,
and turned against Vandire as one. Alicia Dominica
personally pronounced Vandire to be a heretic and
traitor against the Emperor, executing him with the
power blade he had bestowed on her when she became
his personal guard.
The aftermath of Thor’s victory would begin the Age of
Reformation, though the Plague of Unbelief spawned
by the numerous false prophets and separatist rebels,
created by Vandire’s corrupt policies before the rise of
Thor, would need to be quelled before the reformation
would be considered to be truly underway. A rebel
empire had formed beyond the reach of Vandire in the
Galactic south of Fenris, and reaching all the way to
Bakka, united by a heretical and violent will-to-power
philosophy. Had it not been for their catastrophic
error in challenging the Space Wolves of Fenris as they
approached the chapter, and former legion, capitol
system, they might have become another significant
threat to Imperial rule. Instead the defeat began the
rogue empire’s internal collapse, completely ceasing
to exist as a political entity just a few years after their
defeat at the hands of the Space Wolves Astartes
chapter.
As this rebellion never touched Terra or Thor’s new
Ecclesiarchy directly, the rest of the problem elements
were largely brought back into the fold without
exceptional trouble. The first order of business
Thor had to face was his own trial. He had actually
ensured his trial would fairly analyze and judge his
assault on the Emperor’s palace, feeling that to do
otherwise would jeopardize all his coalition stood
for. Not surprisingly, he was quickly found innocent
and installed as Ecclesiarch. A number of policies
were put in place by the Lords of Terra, and by Thor
While the Ordo Xenos had the Deathwatch, and
Malleus had the Grey Knights, the Ordo Hereticus
found themselves naturally affiliated with the Sororitas,
due to both their identical goals and their similar
foundings. Meanwhile, Thor had made a number of
internal changes on his own, first by reducing the size
of each Cardinal’s dioceses and increasing the number
of Cardinals, thus reducing their individual power.
Second, he created the Holy Synod of Terra to further
empower the Cardinals as a group, allowing them to
overrule or even effectively sideline the Ecclesiarch if
sufficiently united. Finally a series of lesser reforms
were put in place throughout Thor’s time as Ecclesiarch,
all intended to move it towards spiritual rather than
political concerns when possible. When he finally felt
he had done all he could, Thor left Terra to travel the
Imperium, returning to the Coalition’s spiritual ideals
of poverty and humble living, while also putting down
heresy and educating the Imperial populace in the
light of the Emperor. He finally, and briefly, returned
to Terra before dying peacefully and contented at the
age of 112 (he opted to refuse juvenat treatment in
the belief that he’d done all that was required of him,
looking forward to a brief retirement in his old age
before joining the Emperor’s side).
Since the Reformation of the Ecclesiarchy, no other
serious changes to the structure of the Imperium
have occurred, and the years that followed have
unfortunately begun to be referenced, due to the
rapidly dwindling resources of the Imperium, as The
Waning. Eight more of Abaddon’s Black Crusades
were launched against the Imperium, and while a
few were as characteristically inept as the 2nd Black
Crusade of M32 (they literally never made it out
of their home territory in the Eye), it was clear that
Abaddon was only growing stronger and more capable
as a leader of Chaos as the centuries passed in the
materium. When not battling back Abaddon’s forces,
the Imperium was dealing with rogue Tech-Priests
blowing up entire star-systems, having to exterminate
xeno psyker incursions, constantly fighting off Dark
Eldar raiders, and all while enduring repeated and
unpredictable Orkish Waaaghs!.
In the past few centuries things have gotten
progressively worse. To those who have seen the
signs and listened to the prophesies of Taggarath,
Seer of Corrinto, the Waning has recently given way
to the Time of Ending. In the year 742.M41, the
independent establishment of trade relations with
the Tau on a number of frontier worlds triggered a
horrified Imperium to launch the Damocles Crusade
into Tau space (apparently unsatisfied with the
number of war fronts they already had to contend
with). The Crusade was largely an abject failure,
smashing the fringe outposts of the Tau but unable to
do any real damage to their empire. Had it not been
for the impending arrival of Hive Fleet Behemoth,
the crusade would likely have become a protracted,
bloody siege with no end or victory for either side.
Sadly, this still would have been preferable to both
forces compared to the arrival of the Tyranid, which
motivated both the Tau and the Imperium to quickly
negotiate a peace and withdraw to their own regions of
space to prepare. A short time later The Tyrannic War
revealed the full and complete horrors for which the
Genestealers had been a mere precursor. The Tyranid
invasion forced the Imperium to develop entirely new
principals and tactics in war, as the strategic doctrine
of Roboute Guilliman favored the Tyranids so heavily
as to make any conflict putting them into action a
complete slaughter. Eventually the Ultramarines
(Guilliman was far less adept with names than he was
with tactics) did adapt, and with these Astartes at the
fore of the attack on Behemoth, the Hive Fleet was
broken and scattered in the year 745.M41, though it
would take a full century for the Astartes chapter to
replenish their numbers. Clearly, Imperial forces did
not have time to rest with Behemoth’s destruction.
Even with the fleet destroyed, the Tyranids never
stopped cropping up in fragments after that, and can
still be found heeding the summons of the Genestealer
cults, even on the other side of the galaxy.
More importantly, the rest of the Imperium’s enemies
didn’t simply back off to let Imperial forces focus
on the Tyranids (the Tau excepted, as they had to
contend with the Hive Fleet as well); Orks, Eldar, and
Chaos raiders relentlessly hammered any target they
could reach. To further complicate matters, in 897.
M41 yet another new and terrible enemy appeared on
the scene. One of the Sororitas fortress-convents on
the eastern galactic fringe, Sanctuary 101, suddenly
ceased response to all communications. When an
investigatory force was sent to find out what had
happened, it was immediately obvious that the
fortress had been attacked and completely wiped out
I mperial P rimer
himself, to ensure the Ecclesiarchy could never gain
enough temporal power to threaten the stability of
the Imperium again. The most significant of these
policies was the Decree Passive, which prohibited the
Ecclesiarchy from maintaining any “men at arms”, an
intentional wording negotiated by Thor to allow the
reformation of the Daughters of the Emperor into the
Adepta Sororitas, so as to serve as the Ecclesiarchy’s
chamber militant. It should be noted, however,
that other clauses of the decree ensured that even
this exception could not grow to a size large enough
to function as an independent army (generally the
Sisters of Battle are used in small-scale strike forces for
tactical purposes, such as the purging of Chaos cults,
or other overt support activity for the Ordo Hereticus
and Imperial Guard). The Inquisition had also taken
Thor’s message and the lesson of the Reign of Blood
to heart as well, creating the Ordo Hereticus to watch
over the Ecclesiarchy to ensure they never crossed the
line into such heresy again (as may be obvious, their
charter quickly expanded to cover all heresies and
internal threats, eventually even including mutants
and unsanctioned psykers).
21
I mperial P rimer
before anyone could signal for help. All that remained
of the slaughter were the flayed corpses of the Sisters,
and a single brief recording of silent blurred shadows,
silhouetted by a sickly green light. No other sign or
record of the assailants could be found, aside from
the structural damage wrought by some form of
incredibly powerful and unknown class of energy
weapon the assailants had used. No corpses or genetic
trace of the enemy were left behind, and no psychic
signature could be sifted from the site beyond the pain
and terror wrought on the Sisters by the enemy, itself
highly unusual given the generally fearless nature of
the Sororitas. Over 50 years have passed since the
Sanctuary 101 incident, and it was not the only event
of its kind. While the Ordo Xenos has managed to
gain a measure of useful intelligence on this new threat,
they have kept it under an unusually tight seal. While
the mysterious video feed recovered from Sanctuary
101 was leaked through a number of channels, thanks
to the panicked naval investigators that first responded
to the incident, anything more is circulated only to the
Inquisitors of the Ordo Xenos (and others on a strict
need-to-know basis).
So now we are in the year of 950.M41, the resources
of the Imperium are running out and enemies are on
every border, with new threats arriving faster than
ever before. The Imperial Guard is draining the PDF
forces of every world they can tap to replenish their
numbers, only to leave the worlds so poorly defended
that they must either take heavy losses to reclaim them
or sacrifice the worlds entirely. Despite this, hope is far
from lost. Simple mortal men, men like the legendary
hero Commisar Ciaphas Cain, have liberated entire
worlds with their personality and tenacity alone. The
Astartes chapters have claimed new worlds as their
domain to ease Terra’s burden, and humanity’s faith in
their Emperor is, in many ways, stronger than ever. A
turning point is approaching, that much is certain, but
what comes next is far from simple predestination.
“As the dark days close in, Mankind stands before the
precipice. Now is the time of judgment, where faith
shall be tested in fire, and courage put to its very limits.
Secession and rebellion are rife in all corners of the
Imperium. Sensing weakness, alien empires close in
from all sides. The Space Marines and Imperial Guard
are at war as never before, defending humanity from
threats within, without, and beyond. This is humanity’s
darkest hour…” – Taggarath, Seer of Corrinto, before
being executed for heresy. 744.M41
22