Galaspar had been settled by humanity as early as the Dark Age of Technology, its surface covered in colossal Hive Cities, larger even than those on Terra.
But none of that truly mattered. As time marched on, everything became fleeting smoke. Glory vanished entirely, leaving only terrifying, nightmarish tyranny and oppression.
Before this campaign, the Death Guard had purged many heretics and xenos species, and without exception, they had all been exterminated to the last. At the very beginning of this campaign, when the data on Galaspar was placed on Mortarion's strategium table, the Primarch discovered something.
Some Monsters wore human skin. In truth, they were no different from xenos; they merely happened to look human.
Galaspar was ruled by a brutal government known as The Association. Thanks to endless expansion, The Association had even taken control of an entire star system. Yet their style of rule treated the population as nothing more than a renewable resource.
To them, everyone apart from themselves, the nobility, was merely an insignificant number—perhaps worth even less than a pet.
If someone grew old, or could no longer continue working because of injury, they would be executed immediately. They distributed powerfully addictive drugs throughout the army and used brainwashing equipment to control them completely. Not even civilians were spared.
Every newborn, upon growing to the age of five, had to be injected with drugs capable of utterly destroying their will and nerves. In this way, they controlled everyone. No one could rebel against them, because they could not even give rise to the will to resist.
Drugs potent enough to kill would destroy any will to resist through the body itself. If you wanted to feel even slightly better amid an unrelieved hunger and thirst, the only way was to labor desperately between fainting