Recaps

Anna led Lorgar and his companions into the sealed Dark Age of Technology facility, where she used her ancient protocols to disarm its defenses. The chapter left them safely walking among a vast army of reactivated robots that Anna intended to take with them.

• Hercules cleared the blocked passage, but Anna stopped Lorgar from entering first and explained that she could identify and quiet the facility’s security systems.
• Anna led Lorgar, Hercules, Cassios, and Grom through the dark corridor while discussing her fragmented memories and criticizing the Imperium’s stagnant technology.
• The group discovered thousands of armed battle robots in a circular hall, and Lorgar ordered everyone to prepare for combat.
• Anna approached the robots and silently communicated with them, changing their red hostile lights to green and making them lower their weapons.
• Lorgar trusted Anna and followed her through the ranks as she announced that they would take the robots and put them to use.

Lorgar's group discovered that Trazyn had entered the ruins before them and that the corridors contained lethal attacks projected from the past. Anna formed a massive nanometal wall to trigger and crush the traps as they advanced.

• A neural interference field disoriented Hercules, Cassios, and Grom, so Lorgar shielded them with psychic energy while Anna traced signs that someone had activated the defenses before them.
• The group found freshly damaged alien constructs, and Lorgar identified them as Necrons and suspected that Trazyn the Infinite was searching the ruins.
• Anna determined that the corridor's traps projected the effects of attacks from the past into the present, making their timing and location impossible to predict.
• Anna gathered loose metal fragments into nanometal armor and sent a massive advancing wall down the corridor to trigger and crush the hidden traps.

Anna led Lorgar and his companions through the ruins’ remaining traps and identified the enormous weapon at their destination as a Wave Cannon. She explained that it could trigger a star’s collapse and supernova, but firing it would cripple its carrier and wear out its capacitors after ten shots.

• Anna used a regenerative nanometal wall to block the corridor’s spacetime traps until their attacks ran out, then confirmed the passage was safe.
• Lorgar and his companions crossed the remaining passages without triggering further defenses and entered a vast chamber containing an enormous cannon.
• Anna analyzed the weapon and identified it as a Wave Cannon powered by a vacuum zero-point energy core.
• Anna explained that the cannon’s catalytic beam could accelerate a star’s evolution, causing it to collapse and explode within a day.
• Anna warned that firing the weapon would leave its carrier unable to fight properly for about a month, and that its capacitors could withstand only ten stable shots.

Anna convinced Lorgar that the Wave Cannon’s mass-producible star-destroying power was more strategically valuable than the far more costly gatekeeper. She then revealed that the cannon was only an appetizer, with the research base’s true secret hidden beyond the dark doorway.

• Lorgar questioned whether the Wave Cannon was practical compared with the gatekeeper that could swallow stars and patrol on its own.
• Anna argued that the Wave Cannon was cheaper to build, easier to reproduce, and could equip the Word Bearers’ warships with strategic firepower.
• Anna offered to refit the Law of Faith into a prototype within a month and teach Lorgar’s Archmagos how to manufacture and maintain the weapon.
• Lorgar accepted the Wave Cannon’s strategic value and declared that the Legion must obtain it and its manufacturing technology.
• Anna pointed to a deeper doorway and revealed that the Wave Cannon was only an appetizer, with the base’s real secret sealed inside.

Lorgar led his group beyond the Wave Cannon and found a colossal ancient warship, where Trazyn was about to claim it. Lorgar confronted him and demanded he withdraw and leave, declaring the ship and the cannon property of the Word Bearers and the Imperium.

• Lorgar ordered his group onward after Anna called the Wave Cannon an appetizer, and they dismantled its core and control modules for study.
• Lorgar and his companions passed through a wrecked passage marked by signs of an intruder fighting the ancient defenses.
• The group entered a vast cavern and discovered a warship larger than an Imperial Gloriana-class Battleship hovering above the floor.
• Lorgar recognized Trazyn reaching toward the warship and roared at him to keep his hands off the prize.
• Trazyn greeted Lorgar with mock warmth and defended his claim to the ship as a guardian of history.
• Lorgar declared the ship and the Wave Cannon belonged to him, the Word Bearers, and the Imperium, then ordered Trazyn to withdraw and leave.

Lorgar forced Trazyn to abandon his claim to the ancient warship by threatening to make him handle administrative paperwork. As Trazyn prepared to flee, he noticed Anna and became consumed by an overwhelming desire to collect her.

• Trazyn argued that he had discovered the ruins and ship first, but Lorgar declared the region and everything in it the property of humanity.
• Lorgar threatened to dismantle Trazyn and drag him back to Colchis to do administrative work, crushing his resolve to bargain.
• Trazyn decided to use Phase Shift to escape and seek another chance to steal the ship later.
• Trazyn saw Anna standing behind Lorgar, and his perception of her as an incomparable collectible stopped his escape.

Trazyn became fascinated with Anna and tried to invite her to his museum, but Lorgar ordered him to leave or face the destruction of his collection. Trazyn produced a strange green Cube as Lorgar readied his Greatsword, leaving the hall on the brink of battle.

• Trazyn stopped his attempt to leave and introduced himself to Anna, who called him an old pervert.
• Trazyn ignored Anna’s insults and invited her to visit his museum, while Anna asked Lorgar if he knew the old fool.
• Lorgar stepped between Anna and Trazyn, warned him to leave the star system, and threatened to raid his museum if he stayed.
• Trazyn produced a small green Cube as Lorgar’s Greatsword shone with golden psychic energy and Hercules gripped his weapon.
• Anna calmly studied the Cube as Lorgar and Trazyn faced off, with battle seemingly imminent.

Orikan intervened in Lorgar and Trazyn’s confrontation, forcing Trazyn to retreat by threatening his museum. Before leaving, Orikan called Lorgar an “Anchor Point” and vanished without explaining what he meant.

• Orikan tore open a rift and fired a beam that carved a void fissure between Lorgar and Trazyn, interrupting their confrontation.
• Orikan told Trazyn he had restarted the world thirty million times to reach that moment and accused him of disrupting a necessary trajectory.
• Trazyn received an urgent warning that Orikan had attacked his museum and collections.
• Orikan threatened to empty Trazyn’s galleries, so Trazyn abandoned his attempt to take the warship and fled through a Dimensional Rift.
• Orikan called Lorgar an “Anchor Point” and departed through rippling space.

After Trazyn and Orikan departed, Anna scanned the colossal vessel and discovered that it was not a warship but a vast containment shell. She concluded that it had been sealed to protect its creators and the outside world from whatever was inside, leaving Lorgar and the others facing an unknown danger.

• Lorgar asked Anna how they should handle the colossal vessel after Trazyn fled and Orikan vanished.
• Anna examined the nearby control platform and scanned the vessel, then said she had no direct records of it despite identifying it as a Dark Age of Technology creation.
• Anna explained that the vessel had been deliberately erased from records and sealed in a heavily defended base in the Ghoul Stars.
• Anna revealed that the apparent warship was actually a massive containment shell surrounding something unknown.
• Anna concluded that the shell was likely meant to protect the people who sealed it and the outside world from what lay inside.

Anna advised Lorgar to leave the sealed Dark Age of Technology relic untouched, report it to Terra, and secure the surrounding facility’s technology. As Gatekeeper drifted out of the system, a brief warp storm swallowed it and deposited it near an Iron Hands expeditionary Fleet.

• Anna warned Lorgar that the enormous Shell protected whoever had sealed its contents away and told him not to force it open.
• Anna instructed Lorgar to report the discovery to Terra, establish a research outpost, and recover the Wave Cannon and other accessible technology.
• Lorgar sent an encrypted report to Terra and ordered the Fleet to transport equipment and deploy screened personnel to search the facility.
• A mortal officer reported that Gatekeeper was drifting out of the Star System, and Lorgar ordered the Fleet to monitor it rather than risk attacking it.
• A brief, silent warp storm swallowed Gatekeeper at the edge of the Star System and transported it to the vicinity of an Iron Hands expeditionary Fleet, where it emerged from realspace.

Lorgar left the Ruins’ research to Malcador’s specialists and wondered whether Horus’s rapid victories against the Orks concealed some other factor. Aboard the Nightfall, Konrad Curze found comfort in a room recreated for his adoptive mother, Teresa, who told him she was proud of him.

• Malcador’s technical team secured the Giant Egg and took over research at the Ruins while Lorgar departed with the Wave Cannon data in Word Bearers’ hands.
• Lorgar reviewed reports of Horus’s swift victories over Urlakk Uruk and suspected that an unexpected factor might explain the Luna Wolves’ progress.
• Curze visited the Nostramo-style room he had built for Teresa and sat with her after handling Fleet reports.
• Teresa praised Sevatar Sejan, Shen, and Fell Zharost, calling Curze’s Legion a remarkable army and a family.
• Teresa told Curze she was proud of him, and he lowered his head, hiding his emotion.

Curze found comfort with Teresa and imagined leaving the Great Crusade to live peacefully with her, but she reminded him of his duty to his Legion and the people they served. He stayed beside her, holding onto her acceptance as his fears and responsibilities briefly receded.

• Curze rested his forehead on Teresa's knees, and she gently stroked his hair as she had when he was a child.
• Curze promised to stay by Teresa's side and described a dream of handing the Legion to Sevatar and settling with her on a peaceful garden world after the Great Crusade.
• Teresa told Curze that his sons and the people they fought for were also his family and responsibility.
• Curze realized he could not abandon his Legion, while Teresa reassured him that she would always be proud of him.
• Teresa reminded Curze that though he walked in darkness, he served the light, and Curze closed his eyes beside her.

Curze met the new Navigator sent by House Velides and questioned the decision to assign a child to guide the Nightfall. He tacitly accepted Aili Velides's appointment, leaving her attendants to begin her handover and acclimatization.

• Curze returned to the Nightfall's Bridge after visiting his adoptive mother, Teresa.
• An elderly attendant told Curze that Ves Morena had retired and House Velides had sent a replacement Navigator.
• Aili Velides arrived, and Curze recognized that she was a girl who appeared no older than fifteen.
• The attendant explained that Aili's exceptional talent and Warp resonance had led House Velides to select her for the post.
• Curze warned that Aili must guide the Legion safely through the Warp, then tacitly approved her appointment.
• The attendants escorted Aili toward the Navigator Spire to begin the handover and acclimatization training.

Corax hunted a Chaos creature to obtain the first of six artifacts he believed he needed to resurrect Bella. He swallowed the creature’s Mark of Chaos and took a vertebra, beginning his dark quest with both objects in hand.

• Corax attacked a powerful Chaos creature in the caverns, targeting the Hexagram mark on its neck.
• Corax tore the mark from the creature and swallowed it, containing its power on an altar within his soul for Bella’s resurrection.
• The creature rapidly withered and dissolved after losing its mark.
• Corax removed a dark, rune-marked vertebra from the creature, securing the first artifact on his quest.

Lorgar and Lion El'Jonson traded military technology and resources, with Lion offering the Word Bearers a Gloriana-class battleship. Anna then advised Lorgar to test the Wave Cannon on the cruiser Yukikaze before installing it on a flagship, and Lorgar approved her plan.

• Lorgar offered Lion El'Jonson half of the recovered Men of Iron units, two Wave Cannons, and access to their production data in exchange for support.
• Lion El'Jonson accepted the Men of Iron and one Wave Cannon, then offered Lorgar the operational Gloriana-class battleship Spear of Logic.
• Lorgar eagerly accepted the battleship, which Lion El'Jonson said would be transferred with a reliable crew and the necessary paperwork.
• Anna warned Lorgar against installing the untested Wave Cannon on the flagship Law of Faith and proposed using the cruiser Yukikaze as a test platform.
• Lorgar approved Anna's plan and ordered the Yukikaze's captain to prepare for special modifications.

Jaghatai Khan punished Temur for bringing back a Demon Blade as a trophy, condemning the Sixty-Fourth Company to lead the coming assault and earn redemption through battle. Temur remained convinced he had done nothing wrong, and his hurt began turning into anger.

• Jaghatai Khan struck Temur across the command deck, and Toghtai Yesugei and Qin Xa urged the Khan to delay judgment until after the battle.
• The Khan denounced Temur for staining the Legion's honor, then snapped the saber Temur had presented and cut his own palm.
• The Khan ordered the Sixty-Fourth Company to serve as the assault's vanguard and said they could regain his trust by proving themselves in battle.
• After the Khan left, Temur questioned what he had done wrong and silently began to seethe with anger.

Horus Lupercal assigned the Legions their roles in a massive assault on Ullanor and launched the Imperial war machine toward the Orks. The chapter ended with Roboute Guilliman directing a devastating fleet strike that destroyed the first Ork forces in the system.

• Horus Lupercal outlined a plan to break Ullanor's defenses and kill the Ork Warboss Urlakk Uruk, assigning roles to Fulgrim, Ferrus Manus, Perturabo, Jaghatai Khan, and Roboute Guilliman.
• Horus committed two hundred thousand Space Marines, more than a hundred billion Imperialis Militia soldiers, and eighteen Imperial Navy battle groups to the campaign.
• The White Scars and Ultramarines began patrolling and clearing the Ullanor system's outer reaches under Roboute Guilliman's direction.
• The Imperial fleet unleashed lances and macro-cannon fire on the Ork raiding fleets, destroying their ships and killing tens of millions of Orks.

Horus led the Imperial assault on Ullanor, clearing the Ork orbital defenses and directing Legion forces toward Urlakk’s fortress. With Brutus’s vanguard established near the target, Horus and Fulgrim prepared to lead the final attack into the Ork Warlord’s lair.

• Horus led the Luna Wolves and Emperor’s Children fleet toward Ullanor, where the Vengeful Spirit destroyed incoming asteroids and Perturabo’s Iron Warriors battered the Ork orbital fortresses.
• Brutus led the Justaerin Terminators in the first drop pods as Imperial forces descended through heavy Ork antiaircraft fire.
• Horus identified Urlakk’s fortress as the target and received reports that the Iron Warriors, Iron Hands, Luna Wolves, and Emperor’s Children had established positions around it.
• Horus summoned Fulgrim and his Phoenix Guard to join the assault on the fortress.
• Horus entered a Primarch assault pod and began his descent toward Ullanor’s surface.

The Iron Warriors launched their ground offensive on Ullanor, using coordinated armor, aircraft, Knights, Titans, and militia to break through the Ork defenses at extraordinary speed. Perturabo noticed that the Orks’ resistance was unnaturally weak and wondered whether the smooth advance was connected to Horus’s assault on a distant fortress.

• Three Iron Warriors Scimitar tank destroyers annihilated an Ork Stompa, signaling the start of the general offensive.
• Perturabo directed the Iron Warriors to form a coordinated spearhead that broke through Ork defenses and targeted their leaders.
• Drop Pods brought in more war machines, while Knights and Titans joined the assault and helped clear the Orks’ barricades.
• Imperialis Militia armored columns followed the Space Marines through the breaches as the Iron Warriors and Iron Hands advanced hundreds of kilometers in hours.
• Perturabo studied the rapidly shifting battle lines and grew wary of the Orks’ unexpectedly disorganized resistance.
• Perturabo wondered whether the smooth advance was connected to Horus and his chosen warriors attacking the distant fortress.

Horus Lupercal led the Luna Wolves in a Drop Pod assault on Urlakk Uruk’s fortress, fighting through overwhelming Ork resistance. As casualties mounted and the advance slowed, Horus ordered his warriors to break through directly to the Ork Warlord.

• Horus and the Luna Wolves crashed Drop Pods into the fortress and burst out to attack the Orks.
• Horus rallied the Luna Wolves and led their charge toward the fortress’s most heavily defended depths.
• Horus shielded his warriors from Ork fire and helped them destroy enemy defenses as the Orks swarmed in from every direction.
• Horus recognized that the Orks’ numbers were slowing the assault and increasing casualties, so he ordered the Luna Wolves to punch through and kill Urlakk.

Horus Lupercal broke into Urlakk Uruk’s hall and fought his way through the Ork bodyguards to challenge the Warboss. Their duel began as the Luna Wolves and Emperor’s Children held back the surrounding Orks, and the battle remained unresolved.

• Horus Lupercal smashed through the fortress’s final partition and identified Urlakk Uruk on his throne.
• Horus charged through Urlakk’s elite Ork bodyguards, cutting a bloody path toward the Warboss.
• Urlakk rose and struck at Horus with his enormous Giant Blade, but Horus dodged and countered with his power sword.
• Urlakk blocked Horus’s attack, beginning their duel in earnest.
• Horus and Urlakk exchanged rapid attacks as the Luna Wolves and Emperor’s Children defended the duel’s perimeter from the Orks.

Brutus and the First Company fought through the ork tide to reach Horus, who was locked in a desperate duel with Urlakk. Horus and Urlakk fell together from the Fortress edge just as Brutus arrived.

• Brutus spotted Horus struggling against Urlakk and ordered the First Company to break through and support the Primarch.
• Horus’s sword weakened under Urlakk’s blows, so he grabbed a fallen Bolter and fired at the warlord’s face to blind and stagger him.
• Horus charged Urlakk and drove him toward the crumbling edge, but Urlakk chose to fall backward while gripping Horus’s pauldron.
• Brutus broke through the orks and saw Horus and Urlakk fall together into the battlefield below.

Horus and Urlakk fought to a brutal standstill until Urlakk shattered Horus’s sword, kicked him beneath rubble, and escaped the First Company Terminators’ attack. As Horus recovered, an urgent report revealed that the White Scars’ defensive line in the Kork Asteroid Belt had been breached, leaving the Expeditionary Force’s flank exposed.

• Horus and Urlakk crashed onto a lookout platform, where both rose badly wounded and prepared to continue their duel.
• Horus charged Urlakk, but Urlakk’s counterstrike shattered Horus’s Power Sword and a kick sent him crashing beneath a broken pillar.
• Brutus and the First Company Terminators fired a furious barrage at Urlakk, who endured it behind his arm before fleeing into a dark passage.
• Horus struggled out of the rubble as Brutus prepared to pursue Urlakk, but an emergency transmission reported that Ork ships had breached the White Scars’ defensive line in the Kork Asteroid Belt.
• Horus and Brutus turned their attention from Urlakk’s escape to the danger facing the Expeditionary Force and the main battlefield at Ullanor.

Jaghatai Khan abandoned Guilliman’s defensive plan and led the White Scars in a charge against an Ork decoy fleet, leaving a gap in the Kork Asteroid Belt Defense Line. A hidden Ork fleet poured through the breach toward Ullanor while the White Scars were trapped in battle.

• Roboute Guilliman coordinated the Ultramarines’ defensive network and the White Scars’ mobile raids against Ork reinforcements at the Kork Asteroid Belt.
• Jaghatai Khan grew restless with the controlled victories and ordered the White Scars to assemble for a direct attack on the largest Ork fleet.
• The White Scars charged into the Ork formation and became locked in a close-range battle with its flagship.
• A second Ork fleet emerged from hiding and drove through the sector left uncovered by the White Scars.
• Ultramarines defense nodes reported a breach as the Ork fleet surged toward Ullanor, while Jaghatai Khan and Blade Storm remained trapped in combat.

The Emperor informed Lorgar that Horus and several Legion forces were surrounded by Orks on Ullanor, and Lorgar agreed to lead a rescue. Lorgar ordered the Word Bearers to Ullanor, while Angron and Curze also set out to help.

• The Emperor contacted Lorgar and told him Horus's force had been surrounded on Ullanor.
• Lorgar agreed to rescue Horus despite knowing that Horus would become a future traitor.
• The Emperor asked whether Horus was suited to become Warmaster, and Lorgar answered that he was.
• Lorgar ordered his warships to Ullanor and told Rockefeller to relay the orders.
• Angron and Curze answered Lorgar's call and headed to Ullanor.