"This campaign! Yet another! Glorious victory!"
Horus stood atop the wreckage of the crashed Aeldari Craftworld, his voice echoing through the skies of Taal with a stirring force like the beat of war drums.
Beneath his feet, the Aeldari Craftworld, once elegant and imperious, lay embedded at an angle in a scorched plain. Its hull had been torn and twisted in the crash, exposing intricate internal structures and energy conduits that still flickered.
Thick smoke rose slowly from cracks in the wreckage, glowing dark red in the setting sun, like a colossal tombstone ablaze.
The people of Taal poured out of their underground shelters. They lined the roads, stood on rooftops and gathered at the edges of fields, greeting their savior with fervent cheers and applause.
The civilians who had been trembling under Aeldari bombardment only moments before now wore expressions of joy at their survival and reverence for their savior.
They showered Horus with petals and streamers, shouting the Warmaster's name. Their voices swelled into a deafening roar that echoed over the plain long afterward.
Countless Legion warriors rallied around Warmaster Horus.
The warriors of the Sons of Horus Legion, clad in deep green Power Armour, stood in orderly formations, forming a wall around the wreckage.
Their Helmet gleamed metallically in the sunset, their weapons glinted coldly beneath the lights, and their eyes were filled with reverence and loyalty toward their father.
Amid the cheers of the Four Kings Council and the excited cries of countless people of Talon, Horus was bestowed with a new title—the "Great Guardian of Taal."
The title passed through the crowd, from one person's lips to another's, spreading like a wave across the entire plain before swelling into a single, earth-shaking chant: "Great Guardian! Great Guardian! Great Guardian!"
Abaddon sat off to one side.