Chapter Summaries

Colonel Müller explained to Commissar Charalad why the Krieg soldiers would continue their assault despite overwhelming losses, then had Charalad sent away before leading his regiment back into battle. The third wave advanced as Müller and his soldiers prepared to keep sacrificing themselves for a victory they might never see.

• Charalad tried to stop the assault, but Colonel Müller restrained him and refused to retreat.
• Müller showed Charalad how the soldiers’ relentless attacks had weakened the enemy fortress, which the Krieg troops then destroyed.
• Müller spoke of the soldiers’ sacrifices as atonement, and a rifle butt knocked Charalad unconscious.
• Müller ordered Charalad sent to Colonel Hans’s regiment and learned the casualty rate had reached ninety-six percent.
• Müller addressed his soldiers by their chosen names, acknowledged Charalad’s worth, and led them toward the battlefield as the third assault wave advanced.

Number 0 led Grenadier 19’s squad through the tunnels and into a cultist mining camp, using a controlled blast to bring down stone cover. As the squad fought the cultists and their mining machine, Number 0 charged into a dense barrage and somehow dodged every bullet with his hands.

• Number 0 warned Grenadier 19’s squad about tunnel hazards and planned to use grenades to collapse the rock above the camp.
• Grenadier 19 detonated the grenades, and the blast sent a widening crack through the mine wall and ceiling.
• Number 0 led the squad around the corner, where they found fifty corrupted cultists and a massive flesh-and-machinery mining creature.
• The ceiling collapsed as Grenadier 19 took cover behind a falling slab, while Number 0 sprinted through the cultists’ fire.
• The cultists concentrated their rotary guns on Number 0, who stopped and moved his hands so quickly that every bullet missed him.

Number 0 and the Grenadiers defeated the cultists and their captain, who transformed into a flesh-and-steel tank. Afterward, Number 0 persuaded Grenadier 19 to bury a fallen comrade and showed the squad how to pry up stone slabs by following red lines he could see.

• Number 0 survived the cultists’ barrage and charged as their depleted fighters were swallowed by the overseer’s living robe.
• The overseer transformed into a flesh tank, but Number 0 deflected its cannon shell and tore open its turret, killing the captain.
• The Grenadiers regrouped and counted two dead, then Grenadier 19 stripped gear from a fallen comrade and Number 0 suggested digging a grave.
• Grenadier 19 agreed to bury the soldier, and Number 0 helped the Grenadiers dig two pits.
• Number 0 taught Grenadier 19 to find and pry up a stone slab, explaining that he could see red lines.

Grenadier 19’s squad rested deep in the tunnels while Number 0 stood watch, and Tzeentch brooded over how Subjective One had disrupted his plans. Tzeentch summoned Rokasna and assigned him a new task connected to Landis Shrine World, offering the disgraced daemon a chance to prove himself.

• Grenadier 19 and the other grenadiers rested and decided to keep advancing without contact from command.
• Number 0 saw no enemies nearby, kept watch, and felt that something was observing him.
• Tzeentch reviewed his failed attempt to keep Subjective One on Landis Shrine World and destroyed his time-reversal device.
• Tzeentch summoned Rokasna, reassured him about his poor record since graduation, and brought up Landis Shrine World.

Rokasna was sent by Principal Tzeentch to the world of Landes with a stack of proposals, while the Archbishop struggled to understand the rebellion and reconsidered his support for the Saint-Adherent Faction. Saint Lakuras appeared to him and began revealing why the Mercy Edict had sparked unrest.

• Principal Tzeentch sent Rokasna through a Warp rift to Landes and privately admitted he was using him to advance sleeper agents and plans.
• The Archbishop recalled discovering the brutal conditions endured by laborers in Meimeiriel Hive and drafting a Mercy Edict to improve their treatment.
• Troubled by the rebellion and the factions around him, the Archbishop began to question whether the Saint-Following Faction was right.
• The relic of Saint Lakuras glowed, and the saint appeared to promise the Archbishop a true revelation about the rebellion.
• Saint Lakuras asked why the rebellion had erupted after the Mercy Edict and beckoned the Archbishop to look, leaving him to realize that they were pieces on a table.

Saint Lakuras showed the Archbishop a vision of workers rising against the church and urged him to suppress them, but the Archbishop recognized the deception and attacked him. The Archbishop vowed to investigate the church’s abuses while confronting the false saint.

• Lakuras showed the Archbishop workers in Memeiriel Hive accusing overseers and priests of exploiting their labor and calling for a strike.
• Lakuras urged the Archbishop to reject the Mercy Edict and crush the workers with blood and fire.
• When the vision shifted to a frightened child, the Archbishop struck Lakuras instead of the child and declared that he was no true saint.
• The Archbishop promised to investigate Priest Lai, tore off his robe, and challenged Lakuras to repent as he prepared to fight.

Rokasna took over Archbishop Rokasna’s body, used the Saint’s scriptures to win the Penitent Legions’ trust, and secretly prepared a rebellion with Changeling demons. As the legions headed for battle, Rokasna planned to turn the fighting into a pincer attack against the Imperium’s forces.

• Lakuras froze the berserk bishop, consumed his soul, and left Rokasna in control of the archbishop’s body.
• Rokasna gathered the church’s senior officials, endorsed the Penitent Legions, and distributed scriptures bearing Saint Lakuras’s teachings.
• After the Saint-Following Faction and other leaders left, Rokasna met Changeling demons who had infiltrated the church and confirmed their readiness to rebel.
• Rokasna ordered the demons to wait for the scriptures to take effect, then attack alongside the Penitent Legions against the Imperium’s forces.
• Rokasna and the demons discussed Priest Lai’s troubles and the upheaval in the Warp, then mourned the closure of Loic the Bartender’s bar.

Number 0 and the grenadiers found Imperial loyalists in the Old Cannon Factory, but a dispute over Krieg protocol led Number 0 to knock his comrades unconscious. After learning how the Chaos-led factory operated, he asked Old John and Mas to help capture the group and get them into an initiation ceremony.

• Number 0 opened the sealed door and met Old John, who explained that the area was the workers' residential quarter of the Old Cannon Factory, controlled by cruel strange lunatics.
• Grenadier 19 tried to execute Old John for failing to resist the invasion, but Number 0 stopped him and knocked down the grenadiers when they attacked.
• Number 0 captured Mas, a young patrolman with an eight-pointed star scar, and learned that the factory's workers were starved, abused, and taken away for mysterious processing.
• Old John and Mas explained that an initiation ceremony—not the carved star—allowed people to join the black-robed group, and Number 0 told them to capture the soldiers as part of his plan.

A mutated black-robed church manager learned that Mas had captured six Krieg soldiers and arranged to recruit him, while his fellow believers brought the prisoners inside. The captors removed the soldiers’ masks and mocked them, including Grenadier 19, before being ordered to hand them over to the higher-ups.

• A black-robed man heard that Mas had captured six Krieg soldiers alive and went to inspect them.
• Mas claimed a star had helped him defeat the soldiers, and the black-robed man offered him church membership and a black robe.
• The black-robed man told the crowd to return to work and ordered his fellow believers to take the prisoners inside.
• The black-robed believers removed the Krieg soldiers’ masks and inspected their faces, then leered at Grenadier 19.
• The black-robed man reading in the room ordered the others to stop tormenting the prisoners and hand them over to the higher-ups.

Number 0 showed the Krieg grenadiers that the Emperor did not demand endless atonement for their ancestors’ betrayal, but wanted them to build a peaceful future after the war. The Emperor sent them back with new purpose, while he and the God-Emperor discussed the risks of changing their outlook and the humanity the Emperor still retained.

• Number 0 freed the grenadiers and challenged their belief that the people they had failed to kill deserved death as sinners.
• Number 0 placed the grenadiers’ hands on his bloodstained Aquila icon, transporting them to a vision of the Emperor.
• The Emperor affirmed that the grenadiers had always been his best soldiers, then told them their true atonement was to live well and build a peaceful world after the war.
• Grenadier 19 asked whether the war would ever end, and the Emperor said Number 0 would help make that possible before sending the grenadiers through a rift.
• The Emperor and the God-Emperor debated whether the revelation would affect the grenadiers in battle and discussed the Emperor’s remaining humanity.

Number 0 and the Grenadiers were taken toward the heretics’ transports after receiving hope and a golden flower from the Emperor. As they were separated for the masters’ plans, a black-robed worker began to realize that the final factory’s completion would consume every last laborer.

• The Grenadier who had argued with Number 0 abandoned death as atonement and chose to live for a new ideal, while Grenadier 19 hid the Emperor’s golden flower over her heart.
• Number 0 and the Grenadiers were chained back onto the cart, where a black-robed man seized Number 0 and raved about past mistreatment before another cultist stopped him.
• The cart passed crowds of laborers being driven toward cargo trucks, while armed giants guarded them and corpses and suffering captives lined the road.
• A superior in an eight-pointed-star robe praised the cultists for capturing the Krieg soldiers and ordered a ritual for the meritorious as the Grenadiers were taken away in iron cages.
• A black-robed worker learned that the final factory was nearly complete and grew terrified as he realized the last collection included men, women, and children; the superior corrected his pledge from “the great cause” to “the Dark Gods.”

Mas was forced to perform a cult ritual, but his compassion for Old John caused him to mutate into a nascent Chaos Spawn. Inquisitor Omar and Laster destroyed the cultists and, after learning the Inquisition headquarters was in danger, returned to the church.

• The black-robed figures returned to find Mas and Old John waiting, and they forced Mas to hold a dagger and prepare to kill Old John.
• Mas refused to stab Old John and transformed into a gigantic ball of flesh, while the dagger-wielding cultist turned on his companions and invoked the Dark Gods.
• Inquisitor Omar and Laster broke into the room, killed the mutated cultists, and Omar shot Mas and Old John to end their suffering.
• Omar and Laster discussed continuing to follow the Saint, but Laster reported that Taro had burned one of his books to warn of trouble at the Inquisition headquarters.
• Omar and Laster used Laster's teleportation coordinate to return to the church.

Taro and Dumb-Dumb were caught in a sudden uprising in Memeiriel Hive when the Ecclesiarchy's Penitent Legion attacked the Inquisition. After Rena's restaurant was destroyed and the loyal forces began to fall, Taro led Dumb-Dumb toward the fighting and tried to reach safety.

• Taro flirted with Rena at her eatery while Dumb-Dumb finished his meal, and Rena sent Dumb-Dumb away with Taro over his shoulder.
• A rocket struck Rena's restaurant, burying her in the ruins as Taro and Dumb-Dumb escaped the blast.
• Taro ordered Dumb-Dumb to fight the armed mob charging them, and Dumb-Dumb's ripper gun tore through the attackers.
• A Tempestus Scions captain told Taro that the Ecclesiarchy's Penitent Legion had rebelled and was attacking the Inquisition hall while communications were jammed.
• Taro ordered the captain to burn Laster's books, but Battle Sisters killed him before he could carry out the order.
• Taro cut his arm, drew the attackers toward himself and Dumb-Dumb, and raced into an alley with the promise of grilled ribs.

As fighting between the Penitent Legion and the Imperial Guard spread through the hive city, Taro and Dumb-Dumb headed through a sewer route toward the Inquisition hall to destroy Laster’s book. Taro reached an air purification station with Dumb-Dumb and prepared to use a krak grenade on its machinery.

• Taro left his hiding place with Dumb-Dumb and tried to lead him into a sewer, but Dumb-Dumb refused until Taro gave him food and later a headlamp.
• Taro disguised himself with an eight-pointed star and approached Penitent Legionnaires attacking a family’s home, but they called him a heretic and charged him.
• Taro killed the squad, gave the family’s twelve-year-old boy his laspistol, and told the mother the hive city had become a battlefield.
• Taro returned to Dumb-Dumb, used the headlamp to coax him into the sewer, and led him through the underground route for nearly an hour.
• Dumb-Dumb tore open a metal plate at the air purification station, and Taro tossed a krak grenade toward the spinning fan below.

Taro and Dumb-Dumb ambushed a Penitent Army transport, seized melta bombs, and blasted their way into the Inquisition fortress. They headed to find Laster, while the chapter ended with the Hive Mind’s impending arrival exposing the grim fate awaiting the Genestealer Cult.

• Taro and Dumb-Dumb escaped the air purification station and saw the Penitent Army purging residents as the Inquisition fortress remained under siege.
• Taro climbed a wall, observed the Penitent Army’s orderly killings, and questioned what drove their behavior.
• Taro used a jammer and an armor-piercing grenade to ambush a Rhino Transport with Dumb-Dumb, then subdued its Battle Sisters.
• Taro found melta bombs and a jump pack in the transport, used the bombs to blast open a firing slit, and flew into the fortress with Dumb-Dumb.
• Taro removed the overheated jump pack from Dumb-Dumb and led him toward Laster’s study for help investigating the unrest.
• The chapter revealed that the Hive Mind was nearing the world and would consume the Genestealer Cultists who had mistaken it for a liberator.

Draco, Taro, and Dumb-Dumb led the remaining Tempestus Scions through the Inquisition fortress while fighting the Ecclesiarchy forces, aiming to reach Laster’s study and burn his psychic tomes. The Scions engaged Canoness Selina as Taro found the hidden books, leaving the confrontation unresolved.

• Draco joined Taro and Dumb-Dumb, learned that more than 240 Tempestus Scions remained combat-capable, and ordered them toward the fortress core to burn Laster’s books.
• Draco altered the corridor’s gravity, giving the Scions an opening to defeat a squad of Battle Sisters despite heavy casualties.
• The survivors reached the core district and found Canoness Selina slaughtering the remaining Scions; she attacked Draco’s group as Taro went to Laster’s study.
• Taro discovered the concealed psychic tomes behind a bookshelf in Laster’s study, while Dumb-Dumb followed him expecting food.

Taro, Dumb-Dumb, and Draco fought the daemon possessing the bishop in the secret chamber and destroyed him, but Taro and Draco were mortally wounded. Omar and Laster arrived afterward, recovered the unprotected book, and honored the dead as martyrs of the Imperium.

• The bishop revealed himself as a daemon and sealed the secret chamber while attacking Dumb-Dumb and Taro.
• Taro joined Dumb-Dumb in fighting the bishop, and Draco arrived and destroyed him with an overheated plasma pistol.
• Draco dragged the dying Taro beneath the stone platform, then activated the melta bomb as Dumb-Dumb left for the kitchen.
• The melta bomb destroyed the room, leaving the book among the ashes.
• Omar and Laster entered the secret chamber, recovered the book, and recognized Taro and Draco's sacrifice.

Inquisitor Omar and Laster fought their way toward Memeiriel Hive’s cathedral, where Archbishop Rokasna and the Changelings prepared a ritual to drag the planet into the Warp. They disrupted the ritual’s defenders, but Rokasna proved far more powerful than they could handle, and the chapter left Laster returning to the material realm in immediate danger.

• Omar examined the wounded Canoness Selina, injected her with a medical treatment, and set off with Laster toward the cathedral.
• Laster sensed a daemon-creation ritual at the cathedral, while Omar warned that the planet could face an Exterminatus order if they failed to stop it.
• Archbishop Rokasna revealed that he had used altered scriptures and psychic suggestion to make the Penitent Legion mistake Memeiriel Hive’s people for daemons.
• Rokasna detected Omar and Laster infiltrating the cathedral, and Omar attacked the Changelings with his heavily armed power armour and psychic shells.
• Laster pinned the wounded Changelings with telekinesis and struck Rokasna with psychic lightning, but Rokasna raised a wall of psychic matter and made Laster’s blood begin to boil.
• Laster phased himself between the Warp and the material realm to escape Rokasna’s attack, but Rokasna blasted Omar away and prepared to crush Laster as he returned.

Inquisitor Omar and Laster fought Rokasna as the demon completed a ritual that threatened Landes, until the Archbishop’s soul briefly turned the tide. A golden flower then purified the sky, Rokasna was rescued through a rift, and the dying Archbishop’s soul joined the light streaming toward the Golden Throne.

• Omar’s Untouchable ashes disrupted Rokasna’s psychic power, but Rokasna overpowered Omar and Laster as the ashes faded and the ritual neared completion.
• The Archbishop’s soul emerged from Rokasna’s body, suppressed the demon, and freed Omar and Laster to strike with plasma and lightning.
• The attack devastated Rokasna’s possessed body and killed Laster, while the wounded Archbishop warned Omar to beware Lakuras.
• Rokasna returned through Lakuras’s relics, seized Omar and the Archbishop, and reignited the ritual as the church transformed into crystal.
• A golden flower appeared over the battlefield, driving back the Warp and scorching Rokasna until a shifting shadow rescued him through a rift.
• The Archbishop died after asking Omar to show him the miracle, and Omar knelt as the Archbishop’s soul and countless others streamed toward the Golden Throne.

Dantik oversaw the Iron Warriors’ raid and tried to recruit the captured Krieg soldiers while his forces prepared to exploit a civil war among the Imperium. Number 0 recognized the name Amalaga, prompting Dantik and his warriors to turn their weapons on him.

• Dantik ordered his slave general to receive three thousand artillery pieces and reprimanded an Iron Warrior for allowing a daemon to form on his armor.
• Dantik crushed the daemon with his forging hammer, then welcomed the captured Krieg soldiers and offered them a place in a new Imperium.
• Number 0 questioned Dantik about the rebellion, but Dantik received word that the Imperium forces had fallen into civil war.
• Dantik approved releasing the Annihilation Cell cultivators and suspending rift transport so his forces could seize Memeiriel Hive’s tithe warehouses.
• Number 0 asked whether the man on Dantik’s communicator was Amalaga, and Dantik and the Iron Warriors drew their weapons on him.