Chapter Summaries

As the Black Templars drove toward T'au and the Tau Empire faced invasions on several fronts, Shadowsun learned that Supreme Ethereal Aun'Va had been assassinated. She hid the news to protect morale and considered using the forbidden Ethereal Phase Ripper to strike the enemy, though she feared its danger.

• The Blood Ravens Librarian learned that Shadowsun's operatives were carrying out secret missions and transporting something onto the planet.
• The Black Templars bypassed the First Sphere Expansion worlds and advanced toward T'au, prompting Shadowsun to order their interception outside the Second Sphere.
• Shadowsun surveyed the Tau Empire's collapsing defenses and worried that no successor could match her or Farsight.
• Bit informed Shadowsun that Supreme Ethereal Aun'Va had been assassinated, and she ordered the information concealed.
• Shadowsun reassured the hopeful Tau that victory remained possible and considered using the forbidden Ethereal Phase Ripper to snipe the enemy.

Gamma World completed the evacuation of Koboi District’s humans and began destroying the abandoned hive world with a colossal heating structure. As the T’au fled the planet and Xien’s resistance realized the danger, the Governor arrived while sacred relics across distant war zones began to resonate.

• Xien and the resistance celebrated as Gamma World’s ships departed with the last human evacuees from Koboi District.
• Staff Officer Skaiqi Sidler ordered a planetary-grade matter decompression code for the abandoned hive world and learned that the Governor would arrive in three hours.
• Commander Angsi reviewed reports of human forces overrunning T’au worlds and discovered that a vast object was being transported from the front line.
• Gamma World dropped a city-sized structure onto the hive world and assembled it into a vast wall as the planet shook.
• The structure began heating the planet, the T’au abandoned the resistance, and Xien ordered his people to run.
• Cisrain returned with the Governor, while sacred relics aboard warships in Mugulath Bay and the Damocles Gulf began trembling in resonance.

Cisrain joined the escalating conflict between the Human and Tau Empires after a sudden event warned that Chaos would intervene and push the galaxy toward annihilation. He ordered Skaiqi to seize multiple Tau core worlds and set out with reinforcements for the Tau Empire’s first celestial defensive line.

• Cisrain reviewed Gamma World’s growing population, talent programs, and research while a World Decoder stripped resources from a planet.
• A sudden event revealed that one of the Four Gods had planted dangers and would trigger them early, promising rewards including a galactic star map, a Chaos Research Institute, and a neutron annihilation blueprint.
• Cisrain concluded that the Human and Chaos forces were competing for battlefield gains and ordered Skaiqi to capture at least two or three Tau core worlds and obtain a C’tan shard.
• Cisrain assembled an expeditionary force with Sigismund and Sidros, including Destroyers, troops, and modified combat mechs, despite his commanders’ concerns about the force’s size.
• The commanders gathered around projections of the Tau Empire, where Space Marine Chapters were attacking the first celestial defensive line, and Cisrain prepared to reach the battlefield.

Cisrain prepared to use the Ouroboros device for a temporary two-way Webway passage, while Skaiqi exploited the Tau Empire’s divisions to expand Gamma World’s invasion. As Orks and Flayed Ones struck the Tau from other fronts, Commander Shadowsun faced crises across the empire and chose to light a beacon that would usher in a new era.

• Cisrain assembled Sidros, Sigismund, Margo, and others to secure both ends of a temporary Webway passage for a swift decapitation operation.
• Skaiqi learned that the Tau Empire had launched indiscriminate strikes on regions containing its own people and used the attacks as propaganda to deepen divisions among Tau-aligned races.
• Skaiqi ordered Gamma World’s forces to accelerate their campaign and seize Kosi'Mai'En's home world as Tau reinforcements faltered.
• Orks returned to Tau-conquered worlds, attacking fleets and planets while gathering wreckage to build battle moons and war wagons.
• Flayed Ones emerged near Mugulath Bay, adding a Necron assault to the Tau Empire’s many crises.
• Commander Shadowsun received reports of invasions, Ork and Necron attacks, war with the Imperium, the Supreme Ethereal’s assassination, Chaos, and racial conflicts, then chose to light the beacon.

A Warp storm and a hidden Chaos ritual threatened Imperial forces across the Damocles Gulf. A Blood Raven Librarian sacrificed himself to seal one rift, but discovered countless more breaches were opening as the Warp descended upon the world.

• A many-armed Warp figure struck an Imperial Navy ship, destroyed its Gellar Field, and exposed its crew and hull to Chaos energy.
• A Blood Raven Librarian remembered that Tau Empire devices had opened a passage to the Warp and regained control of himself through the glow of his Terminator shoulder plate.
• The Librarian broke free of a Chaos sorcerer and used his body and soul to seal a rift, then saw that the Warp was riddled with countless other breaches.
• The Black Templars' relics began to resonate as spatial turbulence shook their battleship and an enemy attacked its chapel.
• The Red Scorpions captured Dicarat after devastating its population, while their fleet and the Astra Militarum ships following them vanished during Warp travel.
• The Morians Chief Librarian discovered that widespread death and emotion had stirred a Warp storm, and that Chaos had trapped the world as the Warp began to descend.

Morians and the remaining Fifth Company Librarians raced to reach the battlefield before Chaos completed its plan, while the war around Is III fed the Warp storm and drew daemons into reality. As fleets struggled to respond and Commander Shadowsun pursued a desperate strategy, a rift opened across space and Izakros prepared to send an expedition through it.

• Morians sensed through the Iron Halo that the battlefield had not yet been completely torn apart, and he and the two remaining Fifth Company Librarians set out to stop the final battle.
• Gray-white Space Marines crossed a Warp passage and searched battlefields for their target, while Chaos-tainted Warp rifts drew daemons onto Is III.
• Black Templars, Astra Militarum troops, and Tau forces fought fiercely on Is III as their violence and emotions intensified the Warp storm.
• Kardan Stronos ordered the Lords of Iron from the Ten Clans to mobilize after Imperial ships encountered Chaos creatures and communications failed in the Warp.
• Commander Shadowsun ordered fleets to defend T'en, ambush the Imperial fleet near Is III, and attack its supply worlds, then received a warning about a growing rift in space.
• A fragment of the Ouroboros activated at Izakros, and its expeditionary troops prepared to cross the brief passage and guard it.

Cisrain left a force guarding the Webway entrance on Gamma World and led Destroyer warriors through it, while Val planned a cautious revenge against him. As Cisrain rushed toward the battle above Is III, a growing Warp rift tore through reality and drew alarm across the Imperium.

• Cisrain entrusted the Webway entrance on Gamma World to elite Silver-White Armor warriors and entered the Webway with several hundred Destroyer warriors.
• Val refused to report the Webway's reopening to Witch King Malekith and ordered assassins to check whether Cisrain was present before attempting revenge.
• Gamma World's defenders prepared to hold the passage until Cisrain returned and warned one another to keep anyone from approaching it.
• Cisrain raced toward the battle above Is III as Imperial ships exchanged fire in space.
• A Warp rift spread toward the human fleet, alarming its naval commander and Astartes Chapter.
• An Astropath screamed that the rift had appeared in the Kaladon Sector, and a psyker near Cadia sensed it as well.

A massive Warp rift engulfed the Is III region, mutating humans, T'au, and machines as Morians and the Blood Ravens tried to reach the Ethereal Phase Ripper. The Grey Knights revealed that Chaos was birthing a new domain, and Aun'Va realized the Chaos God she had bargained with had deceived her.

• A Chaos rift swallowed four T'au core worlds and cut off Is III and the surrounding fleets from contact.
• Morians and the surviving Blood Raven Librarians landed on Is III, where extreme Warp energy caused grotesque mutations and drove combatants mad.
• Morians's group searched for the Ethereal Phase Ripper while defending themselves from both T'au and Space Marines who mistook them for traitors.
• Theodosius regained his senses and agreed to help the wounded Librarian reach the device and destroy it.
• The Grey Knights identified the catastrophe as the birth of a new Chaos domain rather than an ordinary Great Rift.
• Aun'Va realized that the Chaos God who had promised to open a breach had instead arranged for a new Chaos domain to be born.

Aun'Va realized the Chaos Gods had deceived her and were using the Tau Empire to gestate a new Chaos realm, while The Emperor judged the threat manageable. On the battlefield, Lorne and the Grey Knights joined the Blood Ravens and other Chapters, learning they had to destroy the realm's anchor or its planetary overload device before the Chaos Eye opened.

• Aun'Va tried and failed to cut open the Warp womb, then revealed to her chosen that the Chaos Gods planned to transform everyone inside it into Chaos.
• The Emperor concluded that the dimensional gestation showed the Four Gods lacked another way to stop him, and chose not to kill Aun'Va because the Tau could serve as a front against Chaos.
• The Emperor identified the gestation's requirements: a planetary-scale Blackstone overload, more than ninety billion souls, a Chaos Chosen as an anchor, and a remnant zone of the Old Ones' Webway.
• Lorne led nine Grey Knights to the battlefield, where they found time fractured and several Space Marine Chapters mutating under Chaos influence.
• Morians and the Blood Raven Librarians used their psychic power to explain that the battlefield contained a gestating Chaos realm and that its anchor or overload device had to be destroyed.
• A Blood Raven Librarian volunteered to awaken the remaining fighters, while Morians urged the Chapters to form a squad and seize the world from the Warp.

Theodosius and the other awakened Space Marines agreed to fight alongside Morians while the Grey Knights began a ritual to stop Chaos’s descent. The force split between holding back the enemy and reaching the Aether Phase Ripper, where they found a Chaos Chosen waiting.

• Theodosius agreed to cooperate with Morians, and the White Scars and Red Scorpions joined the effort despite their distrust of the Blood Ravens.
• Mayne killed T'au who tried to contact the humans, while the battlefield behind the group fell back into fighting under Chaos’s influence.
• The Grey Knights descended into the fissure and began inscribing holy marks for a ritual, but they were one psyker short and needed ten minutes to finish.
• Morians ordered Dol to hold back the attackers while the others advanced to destroy the Aether Phase Ripper.
• The group reached the device as Chaos forces poured down the fissures, and a Chaos Chosen rose to confront them.

The loyalist Space Marines fought through overwhelming Chaos forces while the Grey Knights tried to complete their ritual. Kasan Sabius and the arriving Chapter leaders faced Angron, whose assault left them with almost no chance of victory.

• Theodosius led the Black Templars, White Scars, and Red Scorpions against the Chaos warband while psychic barriers protected the Grey Knights' ritual.
• Morians expanded his barrier despite his greatly weakened psychic power, while Dol bled and struggled to maintain his own barrier.
• Kasan Sabius arrived on Is III and saw the Red Scorpions corrupted by Chaos, then fought furiously to avenge their defilement.
• Kosarro Khan and Kardan Stronos learned from a White Scars Librarian that a new Chaos dimension was about to form and that a powerful psychic surge was underway.
• Angron emerged as a Daemon Prince and charged the loyalists, sending Kasan Sabius flying and killing an Iron Father with Gorefather.
• The loyalists faced Angron and his World Eaters with few reinforcements and little hope of defeating him.

Cisrain arrived through a Webway gate and fought Angron with the Emperor's Sword, turning the tide as the Imperial forces struggled to reach the ritual site. After severing Angron's arms, Cisrain headed toward the fissure as the fifth Chaos domain began its premature birth.

• As the defenders were pinned down by Angron and Chaos forces, Sabius prayed for the Emperor's guidance and a Webway gate opened.
• Cisrain and his silver-white warriors emerged through the gate and fired weapons that stripped away Angron's defenses.
• Cisrain blocked Angron's battle-axe with the Emperor's Sword, and the clash unleashed a vast psychic shockwave across the battlefield.
• Cisrain wounded Angron with the Emperor's Sword, cut off both of his arms, and decided to take him back for research.
• As the fifth Chaos domain began to be born, Cisrain moved toward the fissure while the fighting kept Stronos and the others occupied.

Morians, the Grey Knights, and the Blood Raven Librarians sacrificed themselves to sever the newborn Chaos realm’s connection to reality and save Is III. The planet returned to real space, but its survivors were left mutated, traumatized, and facing the ruin of their Chapters and faith.

• Morians and the Black Templars fought desperately as the Chaos realm began to emerge and time itself reversed across the battlefield.
• A figure moving against time stabbed the vast Chaos eye with a golden sword, giving the Grey Knights a brief chance to activate Anti-Genesis.
• The Grey Knights and Blood Raven Librarians became logic bombs, sacrificing themselves to sever causality and strip away Chaos’s new physical laws.
• The Emperor’s image and the released souls pulled Is III from the Chaos fetal membrane, leaving a black equatorial scar and recurring Chaos pulses.
• The survivors returned to reality with their memories rewritten, while Imperial fleets detected lasting changes to the system’s physical constants.
• The surviving Imperial humans, Astartes, and T'au discovered widespread mutations and faced despair over the damage to their faith and Chapters.

The Red Scorpions and other tainted survivors faced death or continued fighting as the Chaos-born rift began to heal. Kharn and Lucius escaped after completing their ritual, while the Empire’s attention remained elsewhere and Chaos prepared a wider offensive.

• Kardan Stronos asked the Chapter Masters how to deal with the soldiers corrupted during the war, and the Red Scorpions knelt before Sabius to accept his judgment.
• Sabius executed the corrupted Red Scorpions, while Rutes killed himself rather than live with Chaos’s mark.
• Theodosius, Mayne, and other tainted survivors chose death or battle, as the Chaos-born rift left a permanent scar on the planet.
• Kharn and Lucius escaped after the ritual revived Chaos warriors, and Nurgle declared that the Black Crusade had begun.
• The Iron Father told Stronos that the Webway was healing, and Stronos acknowledged it.

Stronos watched Cisrain leave and told the Iron Lords that a Primarch had returned, while a psychic research station began studying Chaos and Gamma World prepared vast planetary machinery. The chapter left the station’s captives trapped in suppressive tanks as construction continued on Karamat.

• Cisrain acknowledged Stronos and the Iron Lords before departing through the Webway, and Stronos told them that a Primarch had returned.
• Stronos learned that the Inquisition’s fleet was approaching and that Abaddon’s Black Legion had appeared on Cadia, while the corrupted warriors faced possible Exterminatus.
• Researchers brought Chaos creatures to a psychic laboratory above Ozrax, where the station suppressed psychic powers and restrained its captives.
• A trapped warrior recognized Magnus, Angron’s head, Abaddon’s head, and members of several Space Marine Chapters inside the laboratory, and Magnus said the warrior would join the first batch of live experiments.
• Vetius praised the Omnissiah as a huge domed spacecraft neared completion on Gamma World, while enormous structures rose on Karamat.

Gamma World launched its expeditionary fleet and began deploying a compressed base on Karamat to establish a new Forge World against the Tyranids. As the base took root, Karamat’s inhabitants watched from below, and the planet was set to become a Utopia world like Gamma World.

• Gamma World shifted heavy industry to its hinterlands and organized four surrounding worlds into a defensive and production network.
• Gamma World dispatched First and Second Expeditionary Army Groups, numbering more than fifty thousand Space Marines, to expand its military reach.
• Vetius admired Gamma World’s rapid growth and sought a transfer to repair the Sacred Khala, hoping to gain access to the Synapse Condenser.
• Gamma World’s fleet carried a base to Karamat, a mineral-rich world whose small human-like inhabitants saw the descending structure in the sky.
• The base drove its spine-like lower section into Karamat, beginning the planet’s compression into a Utopia world.

A psyker warned Chief Tusk that Genestealers had infiltrated the tribes, while an STC Template landed and began linking to the planet and assembling a factory. Its researchers identified the Genestealers as a planetary threat and ordered a purge.

• A persecuted psyker pleaded with Chief Tusk to believe that Genestealers had replaced tribespeople and were destroying their race.
• The STC Template drove its underground network into the planet, scanned its resources, and connected to geothermal energy.
• Researchers aboard a starship confirmed that the STC Template was functioning and authorized the world factory to begin production.
• The STC factory emerged beneath its silver canopy as mechanical forces deployed and nearby creatures watched in fear.
• Captain Dean's team identified the planet's infiltrators as third-generation Tyranid Genestealers and ordered the planet purged.

Gamma World launched an extermination campaign against the Genestealers and all other life on the planet, while building factories around [Brain]. Cleansers descended to begin the purge as the Empire pursued a weapon that could eliminate life across an entire planet at once.

• Gamma ordered the soldiers to kill every living creature on the planet so the Genestealers could not spread to Gamma World.
• Chief Tusk and the tribal chiefs saw the Genestealer hybrids attack and retreated after witnessing the humans' powerful weapons.
• Gamma World soldiers and combat mechs pursued the fleeing aliens, struggling to aim at their small targets while continuing the purge.
• The STC Template monitored the assembly of surface factories as [Brain] incorporated underground mineral regions into its calculations.
• Gamma's forces reported to the governor and deployed Cleansers, while the Empire continued researching the Colossus Project.

Gamma World researchers traced the energy behind Gauss Weapons and Living Metal to a possible C'tan source, and Cyrus ordered an expedition to seize it. The Second Army's Third Company prepared to investigate Necron territory.

• Researchers at the Gauss Laboratory identified a signal linking Necron weapons and Living Metal to a distant source and reported it to Professor Brown.
• Brown sent the findings to Cyrus, who concluded that Gamma World needed its own C'tan energy source to use Necron technology without limits.
• Cyrus ordered the Second Army's Third Company to plan an operation against the suspected Necron site.
• The Third Company welcomed the mission and began reviewing the limited Necron information in Gamma World's database.

Cyrus reflected on the Blood Ravens’ rebellion and Gamma World’s growing gene-ascension program before leading newly promoted captains and inexperienced recruits on an investigation of a Necron world. The team arrived at an ochre-yellow planet where Orks were already scavenging, and Cyrus sent probes down to investigate.

• Cyrus learned that the Blood Ravens’ Fifth Company had rebelled, opened a Warp rift, and unleashed daemons before the Chief Librarian and two Librarians sealed it.
• Cyrus visited Utopia on Gamma World, saw its unusually capable newborn recruits, and decided to stay rather than return to the Blood Ravens.
• Yalta and Talon led new recruits through mission preparations, teaching them to use the Blood Ravens’ database and avoid direct combat with the Necrons.
• Cyrus announced that the team had arrived at an ochre-yellow planet and ordered two probes launched toward its surface.
• Ork boys scavenging near the planet watched a probe fly past while one Ork told two Gretchin stories about Gork, Mork, and a powerful human commissar.