Chapter Summaries

Hill led the Ultramarines through a forest battle against Aeldari Rangers whose stealth defeated their scanners and whose ambushes weakened the Imperial force. After the Rangers tried to kill him, Hill captured both alive and handed them to his battle-brothers.

• Hill ordered the Ultramarines to rely on their senses and instincts after their scanners failed to reveal the Aeldari.
• The Aeldari harassed the Ultramarines by destroying supply vehicles, sabotaging equipment, and assassinating mortal officers.
• Hill evaded an Aeldari jetbike ambush and shot the craft, forcing its two riders to crash and flee on foot.
• Hill deflected the Rangers’ shuriken fire and fought them at close range, using his power armor’s strength to overpower them.
• Hill knocked both Rangers unconscious, chained them, and handed them over to his battle-brothers.

Nykona Sharrowkyn hunted the Aeldari commander Illic Nightspear through the forest, and the two clashed after Nightspear recognized Sharrowkyn’s Necron weapons. Their duel turned against Nightspear until an Aspect Warrior intervened, and Sharrowkyn fired his plasma pistol at the newcomer.

• The Ultramarines pushed the Aeldari Rangers back as fighting escalated across the ground and in the air.
• Nykona Sharrowkyn found and killed a concealed Aeldari Ranger with his Gauss sniper rifle.
• Illic Nightspear ordered his followers to keep the humans occupied and went to hunt the wielder of the Necron weapon.
• Nightspear dodged Sharrowkyn’s shot, then charged him with the Voidbringer and a power sword.
• Sharrowkyn blocked Nightspear with his power sword and C’tan phase sword, then drove him toward defeat.
• An Aspect Warrior stepped in to block Sharrowkyn’s fatal strike, and Sharrowkyn fired his plasma pistol at her.

Barabas Dantioch, also called Nykona Sharrowkyn, held off Ilic Nightspear and a Howling Banshee while waiting for the Iron Hands to lock onto their position. He teleported back to the forward base just before their fission bomb struck, while Ilic tried to shield the Howling Banshee from the blast.

• The Howling Banshee and Ilic Nightspear attacked Barabas Dantioch together, but he parried their strikes and resisted the Banshee's psychic scream.
• Barabas Dantioch endured the Howling Banshee's strongest psychic shockwave and identified himself as Nykona Sharrowkyn, a Raven Guard warrior.
• Ilic Nightspear asked what Barabas Dantioch was waiting for, and Barabas revealed he had been stalling until his comrades could provide fire support.
• Ilic Nightspear grabbed the Howling Banshee and fled as the Iron Hands dropped a fission bomb onto the battlefield.
• Barabas Dantioch activated his teleport beacon and returned to the forward base just before the explosion, while Ilic shielded the Howling Banshee with his body and a psychic barrier.

Barabas Dantioch returned to the forward base as the Aeldari revealed their Wraithknights and inflicted heavy losses on the human Knight mechs. With the Aeldari outnumbered and divided over whether to retreat, Uslan proposed negotiating with humanity's ruler to end the war.

• Barabas Dantioch reported to Lox that he had failed to kill the enemy commander, though the Iron Hands' bombardment had already disrupted the enemy command system.
• Lox and Barabas Dantioch observed the allied Aeldari retreat before the Ultramarines, then watched two Wraithknights ambush the human Knights and destroy three of them.
• Illic Nightspear ordered the savage Aeldari to prepare to evacuate, but a wounded Howling Banshee told him they refused to abandon their world spirit.
• Illic set out to find Chief Karen and persuade him to retreat, but Uslan appeared and warned that continued resistance would bring death.
• Illic asked Uslan for guidance, and Uslan offered to negotiate with humanity's ruler because humanity sought the Blackstone and did not bear great hostility toward the Aeldari.

Uslan persuaded the Aeldari leaders to withdraw and negotiate with humanity, arguing that their people could not afford to keep fighting over Pandora. As the battlefield fell quiet, Uslan approached Commander Hill and declared that he had come to negotiate.

• Uslan argued that humanity was not the Aeldari’s true enemy and that they should seek peace rather than waste more lives defending Pandora.
• Uslan challenged Illic Nightspear and the others to admit that their concern for the Exodites did not justify fighting humanity to the bitter end, and Illic agreed to follow his plan.
• Uslan told the Aeldari forces to retreat, and the Aspect Warriors covered the Exodites as they withdrew from the battlefield.
• Commander Hill watched the Aeldari retreat while Chief Librarian Troy detected a calming psychic field spreading across the battlefield.
• Uslan emerged from the forest, approached Commander Hill, and announced that he had come to negotiate.

Lox received the Aeldari seer Uslan, who proposed a ceasefire and offered humanity the Blackstone on Pandora. Uslan began explaining Blackstone’s ancient connection to the C’tan, and Lox asked him to reveal what the Aeldari knew about them.

• Hill doubted Uslan’s peaceful intentions, but Lox ordered him to bring the seer to the forward base under guard.
• Uslan endured the Untouchables’ soulless field and demonstrated his sincerity by approaching them and asking to meet Lox.
• At the meeting, Uslan said he wanted to settle the conflict between humanity and the Aeldari and fashioned a psychic imitation of the Crown of Isha.
• Uslan proposed a ceasefire and offered humanity Pandora’s Blackstone, saying it could help resist Chaos.
• Uslan explained that Blackstone was not made by the Necrons and described a theory that the C’tan Mag’ladroth, the Void Dragon, created it.
• Lox asked Uslan to tell him what the Aeldari knew about the C’tan.

Uslan explained to Lox how the C'tan transformed the Necrontyr into soulless Necrons and how the C'tan and Necrons fought the Old Ones. He revealed that the Void Dragon, Mag'ladroth, created Blackstone to counter the Old Ones' psychic powers, leaving Lox stunned by the C'tan's power over matter.

• Uslan told Lox that the C'tan were ancient beings born from the universe's energies and that the Necrontyr gave them living metal bodies.
• Uslan explained that the C'tan tricked the Necrontyr into biotransference, devouring their souls and leaving behind Necrons with living-metal shells and copied memories.
• Lox concluded that the Necrons' technological advancement had come from the C'tan and that their bargain had cost them their souls.
• Lox pressed Uslan to explain Blackstone, prompting the seer to describe the Old Ones and their Webway network.
• Uslan said the Necrons allied with the C'tan against the Old Ones, whose psychic powers initially held them back.
• Uslan revealed that the Void Dragon, Mag'ladroth, created Blackstone as an anti-psychic substance, and Lox marveled at the C'tan's power.

Uslan explained how the War in Heaven polluted the Warp and gave rise to Chaos, arguing that humanity and the Aeldari shared an interest in resisting it. He left Lox with a warning that humanity’s daemon princes were a uniquely special kind of Warp daemon.

• Lox compared the Necrons’ and Aeldari’s accounts of the War in Heaven and accused Uslan of wanting humanity to serve as the Aeldari’s shield.
• Uslan admitted that he hoped humanity would help protect the Aeldari, but said their peoples shared common interests against Chaos and other threats.
• Uslan explained that the War in Heaven’s deaths and suffering had polluted the once-neutral Warp and led to the birth of the Chaos Gods.
• Lox asked about Samus, and Uslan identified the daemon as a relatively ordinary servant of Chaos Undivided.
• Uslan said humanity was now the galaxy’s most prosperous and powerful race, making it a target of the Warp, and revealed that human daemon princes were an exceptionally special kind of daemon.

Lox and Seer Usran discussed Chaos, prophecy, and their efforts to prevent Fulgrim's corruption before sharing a drink and beginning to build trust. Usran then revealed that the Cabal had sent a Perpetual assassin to kill Vulkan, leaving Lox demanding an explanation.

• Usran told Lox that he had tried to warn Fulgrim on Talos but failed, losing an ancient Wraithlord, an avatar of Khaine, and many Aeldari maiden worlds to retaliation.
• Lox recalled encountering Fulgrim at Isstvan V and lamented that the Emperor's Children had betrayed the Emperor.
• Lox and Usran spoke at length, shared Aeldari meditation liquor, and toasted what Usran called the first step toward unity between humanity and the Aeldari.
• Usran said his psychic projection had observed Lox on Macragge and revealed that the Cabal had sent a Perpetual assassin to kill Vulkan.
• Lox demanded that Usran explain the Cabal's plan and why so many people wanted Vulkan dead.

Lox learned that the Cabal, an ancient xenos organization, planned to weaken humanity to defeat Chaos and had sent agents to kill Vulkan. Uslan revealed that he had dispatched the secretly loyal Word Bearer Narek to hunt the agents on Macragge, leaving Lox worried that the operation would trigger wider chaos.

• Uslan explained that the Cabal had recruited Alpharius and was targeting loyal primarchs to weaken humanity.
• Lox grew furious at the Cabal’s plan and asked how its agents intended to kill Vulkan.
• Uslan said the Cabal’s human agent John Grammaticus had received a Fulgurite Spear capable of killing Perpetuals.
• Uslan revealed that he had sent Narek to eliminate the Cabal’s agents and was also trying to turn John against them.
• Lox questioned why Uslan had not warned Guilliman directly, then hoped the operation on Macragge would not go wrong.

John Grammaticus and Narek encountered Cabal agent Damon in the underground tunnels beneath Macragge, where Damon urged them to kill Vulkan with a fulgurite spear. John struggled between obeying the Cabal and trying to save Vulkan, and the chapter left him considering defying the Cabal despite the danger.

• John and Narek traveled through Macragge’s underground pipelines while planning how to reach Vulkan, whom John sensed was contained in a secret Ultramarines base.
• Narek heard an approaching stranger and drew his weapons, but John stepped between him and Damon, another Cabal agent who had come to find him.
• Damon told John that the Cabal wanted Vulkan killed and pointed out the fulgurite spear that could permanently kill a Perpetual.
• Damon explained that the Cabal intended Horus to win and humanity to go extinct, believing the resulting catastrophe would burn away Chaos.
• John remembered Eldrad Ulthran’s plea to serve humanity and considered refusing the Cabal’s orders, even if it meant his final death.

John, Damon, and Narek infiltrated an Ultramarines base to find Vulkan, whom John intended to kill with the Fulgurite Spear. With Vulkan's location still unknown and their distraction unlikely to last, John searched desperately while resolving to be a hero at least once.

• John told Damon he planned to kill Vulkan with the Fulgurite Spear, while Damon suspected he meant to betray the Cabal.
• John, Damon, and Narek planned to draw the Ultramarines away from their base, and Damon revealed he had a sealed Warp daemon to use as a distraction.
• Damon threw the bottle near the base, releasing a monstrous Warp daemon that brought the Ultramarines to full alert.
• John and the others used the chaos to infiltrate the secret base, where John searched psychically for Vulkan.
• John sensed Vulkan's pain and fury but had not yet found him, and he urged himself to be a hero once.

John, Damon, and Narek reached Vulkan’s stasis chamber and shut down the field so Damon could kill him. Vulkan dodged the shuriken fire and summoned Dawnbringer, leaving the three intruders facing an armed primarch.

• John used his psychic powers to guide the group through the base and learn how its defenses worked.
• John implanted false memories in two Ultramarines, convincing them that the Dark Angels had attacked Guilliman, and sent them racing to the surface.
• Damon ordered John to disable Vulkan’s stasis field while Narek locked the chamber door.
• John shut down the field, and Damon fired his shuriken pistols at Vulkan, but Vulkan moved too fast for the shots to hit.
• Vulkan summoned Dawnbringer through a Warp rift and grasped his warhammer.

Damon, John, and Narek struggled to survive after Vulkan broke free and attacked them with Dawnbringer. The chapter left Narek gravely injured, Damon crushed, and John alone before the raging primarch.

• Vulkan broke free of the stasis field and attacked the three agents, crushing Narek with a single warhammer blow.
• Damon dodged Vulkan's attacks and fired starshuriken rounds that tore through the primarch's body, but Vulkan rapidly healed.
• Vulkan used Dawnbringer to unleash Warp energy, then vanished with the warhammer after Damon wounded him.
• Damon helped pull Narek from the wall and tried to get him back on his feet.
• Vulkan reappeared behind Damon and smashed him into a puddle of blood, leaving John as the only agent still able to move.

John tried to awaken Vulkan and free him by transferring his Perpetual power through the Fulgurite Spear. After Narek shot Vulkan and Damon encouraged John to follow through, John plunged the spear into Vulkan’s chest, and its blinding light began draining John’s immortal power into him.

• John summoned Vulkan’s lost soul and prepared to use the Fulgurite Spear to transfer his Perpetual power to him.
• Vulkan instinctively swung his warhammer at John after sensing the spear’s danger.
• Narek shot Vulkan in the head, briefly stopping him, but Vulkan immediately began regenerating.
• Damon completed his resurrection and urged John to do what he had always wanted to do.
• John drove the Fulgurite Spear into Vulkan’s chest, releasing blinding psychic light that burned the Warp daemon and began draining John’s power.

Damon escaped the secret base with John's body after Vulkan's resurrection failed, while Guilliman discovered that assassins had reached Vulkan despite his defenses. Guilliman placed Vulkan in a golden coffin and decided to tell Lion and seek his advice, still hoping Vulkan would awaken.

• Damon found that the Fulgurite Spear had lost its power, then carried John's body through a Warp portal and escaped.
• Guilliman questioned Valentius about Vulkan's apparent death as Titus reconstructed the assassination with a psychic investigation.
• Titus identified the infiltrators as two mortal Psykers and a Word Bearer, and Guilliman ordered the paralyzed Narek kept alive for questioning.
• Guilliman mourned Vulkan and blamed himself, while worrying that the hidden organization behind the assassins might threaten Lox.
• Guilliman had the Adeptus Mechanicus make a golden coffin for Vulkan and decided to inform Lion and ask for advice.

After learning that Vulkan had been pierced through the heart by a Fulgurite Spear, Guilliman and Lion sought Konrad Curze’s counsel in prison. Curze said he had foreseen Vulkan’s death and return to life, leaving Guilliman with hope that their brother would revive.

• Guilliman told Lion that Vulkan had been assassinated and showed him Vulkan’s body in a golden coffin.
• Guilliman proposed asking Konrad Curze for guidance, and Lion reluctantly agreed to visit him.
• Guilliman and Lion passed the prison’s security checks and found Curze reading a copy of "The Old Man and the Sea."
• Curze said the prison had reduced his prophetic visions and explained that the future could change.
• Curze revealed that he had foreseen Vulkan die and return to life, becoming the Emperor’s final safeguard.

Guilliman told the Salamanders how Vulkan had fallen and returned his brother’s body to them, then welcomed Sanguinius and the battered Blood Angels to Macragge. The three primarchs reunited at a banquet hall, while Sanguinius arrived burdened by the horrors and betrayal he had endured.

• Guilliman and Lion left Konrad imprisoned, and Guilliman considered Curze’s claim that Vulkan would return to life.
• Guilliman told Captain Zartos and the Salamanders how Vulkan had gone mad and been imprisoned; they silently stood vigil beside Vulkan’s golden sarcophagus.
• A signal revealed that Sanguinius and the Blood Angels were approaching Macragge, and Guilliman took Macragge’s Honour to welcome them.
• The Blood Angels passed through the Warp pursued by hostile entities, then cooperated with Guilliman’s inspections of their fleet.
• Sanguinius arrived at Guilliman’s banquet hall with the Sanguinary Guard, and he reunited with Guilliman and Lion.

Guilliman and Lion explained to Sanguinius that they had founded the Second Imperium in the Five Hundred Worlds because the Warp storm prevented them from returning to Terra. After hearing their case, Sanguinius emerged as their preferred candidate to serve as its regent.

• Sanguinius reunited with Guilliman and Lion and described the Blood Angels' losses and betrayal at Signus.
• Sanguinius asked his brothers to help him return to Terra and aid the Emperor, but Guilliman and Lion explained that Lorgar's Warp storm had cut off the route.
• Guilliman revealed that he and Lion had established a Second Imperium as a backup for humanity, and Sanguinius listened warily as Guilliman explained his decision.
• Guilliman showed Sanguinius the primarchs' hall and described the absent Perpetual Lox, whose own chair stood beside Guilliman's.
• After Guilliman recounted his reasons for founding the Second Imperium, Sanguinius asked Lion whether he supported the plan, and Lion nodded.

Guilliman, Sanguinius, and the Lion swore a secret blood pact to found a Second Empire if Terra had fallen, while Guilliman remained unaware of the pact’s psychic force. On Pandora, Lox negotiated with Uslan over the Exodite Eldar’s departure so humanity could mine the planet’s Blackstone.

• Sanguinius proposed that he, Guilliman, and the Lion swear loyalty to the Emperor and join forces to march on Terra once the Warp storms subsided.
• The three primarchs mixed their blood on the pact, creating a psychic concept known as the Second Empire; Sanguinius and the Lion sensed its power, but Guilliman felt nothing.
• Guilliman stored the pact in an adamantium stasis field and declared that the Second Empire would remain secret unless Terra had fallen.
• Lox sneezed during negotiations on Pandora, and Uslan explained the Exodite Eldar chieftain Kallen’s demand that the surviving Dragon Riders be released to remove their World Spirit.
• Lox agreed to the Exodites’ terms and urged Uslan to help them leave Pandora quickly so humanity could establish its Blackstone mining base.