Chapter Summaries

Chaghatai Khan's Sky Eagle devastated Ashurden's rebel fleet and planetary defenses, prompting Ashurden to send boarding forces to cripple the super-warship. The surviving boarders teleported into the ship and met Gantula, Qin Xin, and the White Scars, who began cutting them down.

• Chaghatai Khan drove the Sky Eagle through the rebels' defenses, bombarding planets and orbital platforms as Ashurden tried to rally his fleet.
• Ashurden ordered his finest warriors to board the Sky Eagle after his fleet's attacks failed to penetrate its shields.
• The Sky Eagle destroyed many boarding craft, and only a fraction of the rebel Astartes reached the ship after breaching its shields and attempting beaconless teleportation.
• Gantula and Qin Xin led the White Scars and mortal auxiliaries against the Sons of Horus and Iron Warriors who appeared aboard the ship.
• Qin Xin charged into the rebels and killed them with his power guandao.

The White Scars fought off the Sons of Horus boarding party aboard the Sky Eagle while Jaghatai Khan used its planet-killer cannon and void shields to destroy the rebel fleet’s attacking battleships. Velen Ashurden accepted defeat and ordered a report sent to Horus, warning that only a primarch could stop Jaghatai.

• The White Scars’ Keshig Guard defeated most of the Sons of Horus boarders, and the survivors were killed by the Sky Eagle’s automated weapons when they tried to escape into its lower decks.
• Velen Ashurden ordered three battleships to ram the Sky Eagle, intending to keep it from joining the Imperial fleet’s counterattack.
• Jaghatai Khan fired the Sky Eagle’s planet-killer cannon and destroyed two charging battleships.
• Jaghatai accelerated the Sky Eagle into the final ramming ship, whose hull was crushed and disintegrated against the warship’s void shields.
• Velen Ashurden admitted defeat and ordered his forces to report to Horus that Jaghatai stood in their way.

Chaghatai Khan defeated the rebel fleet at Zeta Garmon, then ordered the destruction of planets where enemy forces remained. After eradicating the resistance on Zeta Garmon Ten, he departed the system with his fleet.

• Chaghatai Khan led the Imperial fleet in a week-long battle that destroyed the rebel naval forces, though his fleet lost a quarter of its warships.
• Gantula reported that the White Scars had recovered rebel gene-seed, and Chaghatai ordered the Legion to check it for Chaos corruption before reuse.
• Chaghatai learned that rebel forces remained in underground fortifications on Zeta Garmon Ten and ordered Exterminatus rather than occupy the planets.
• Nugan Khan arranged orbital bombardments, and a Mechanicus priest deployed the Sky Eagle's continental shelf oscillation bomb against Zeta Garmon Ten.
• The bomb triggered massive earthquakes and shifting continental plates that crushed the rebels' underground shelters and buried the survivors.
• Chaghatai destroyed the rebels' control of the region and departed the Zeta Garmon system with his fleet.

After the traitors suffered a crushing defeat at Zeta Garmon, Ashurhaddon tried to unite the bickering Legion representatives and assess their next moves. He revealed that Horus was secretly seeking the Blackstone Fortress, while warning that the absent Dark Angels and Lion El'Jonson posed the greatest threat.

• Ashurhaddon watched the Sons of Horus fleet vanish from the display as the representatives argued over their defeat and the White Scars' powerful new warship, the Sky Eagle.
• The Iron Warriors commander questioned the return of the captured Aelkenax, prompting the Emperor's Children representative to defend him and Ashurhaddon to stop their quarrel.
• Ashurhaddon privately recalled that Horus had gone to retrieve the Blackstone Fortress, which he believed could counter the Sky Eagle.
• Ashurhaddon warned the traitor commanders that Lion El'Jonson was their key enemy and that Jaghatai Khan's White Scars movements might be concealing the Dark Angels' plans.
• The World Eaters captain dismissed Ashurhaddon's concerns and demanded more opportunities to kill, leaving Ashurhaddon exhausted by the Legions he was expected to lead.

Ashurhaddon received Horus’s message that he had returned, while Horus traveled to a hidden Aeldari Crone World to claim the Blackstone Fortress. Horus began awakening the ancient weapon and declared that he could control it without its two keys.

• Ashurhaddon ordered the Alpha Legion to stir unrest behind Imperial lines and relied on the Iron Warriors to strengthen the defenses at Beta-Garmon.
• A Gasterlin Terminator delivered Horus’s astropathic message to Ashurhaddon, stating that Horus had returned.
• Horus arrived aboard the Vengeful Spirit at a hidden dead Aeldari Crone World with Kelbor-Hal and reflected on the Primarchs who had refused to join him.
• Kelbor-Hal identified the Blackstone Fortress as an Aeldari relic and said it required the Hand of Darkness and the Eye of Night to control.
• Horus manipulated the Warp to shield his fleet from the dead star’s gravity and sensed the Blackstone Fortress awakening.
• Horus said he could control the Blackstone Fortress without possessing its two keys.

Horus explained the origins and safeguards of Blackstone Fortresses to Kebor-Har, then revealed enough of his power to awaken the ancient fortress above the Crone World of Death. The fortress turned its weapons toward Horus’s fleet and fired a beam of aetheric energy.

• Kebor-Har asked whether the Blackstone Fortress was created by the Aeldari or the Necrons, and Horus said both factions had possessed versions of the weapon.
• Horus explained that the C'tan had created Blackstone and that the Necrons and Aeldari had used Blackstone Fortresses against their enemies and gods.
• Kebor-Har concluded that more Blackstone Fortresses must exist and lamented that the Dark Mechanicum lacked the Hand of Darkness and the Eye of Night.
• Horus revealed a fraction of his true nature, prompting the Blackstone Fortress above the Crone World of Death to awaken in response to the threat.
• The fortress gathered immense Warp energy, turned toward Horus’s fleet, and fired a brilliant beam of immaterial light.

Horus used his Warp power to withstand the Blackstone Fortress’s attack, seize control of the fortress, and discover a Webway gate. After an Aeldari god barred him from entering its library, Horus rejoined Abaddon and the Sons of Horus and prepared to return to Beta-Garmon to approach his brothers again.

• The Blackstone Fortress unleashed a psychic attack, but Horus absorbed its power and reached the fortress.
• Horus overwhelmed the fortress’s consciousness, took control of it, and entered its interior.
• Horus found a Webway gate and tried to tear it open, but a clown god from an Aeldari library forbade his entry and collapsed the gate.
• Abaddon and the Justaerin Terminators arrived on the fortress and found Horus unharmed.
• Horus told his sons to return to Beta-Garmon, where he would ask his brothers whether they would stand with him or oppose him.

Horus captured the Blackstone Fortress, and Maloghurst took charge of securing it for the Sons of Horus. He sacrificed its mortal slaves and transformed five thousand Inductii into daemon-hosting Blessed Sons, leaving the fortress increasingly corrupted by the Warp.

• Horus forced the Blackstone Fortress to follow the Vengeful Spirit, then returned to his throne as the fleet headed for Beta-Garmon.
• Maloghurst urged Abaddon to call Horus the Warmaster and offered to oversee the Blackstone Fortress; Abaddon authorized him to take charge.
• Maloghurst led five thousand Inductii to the fortress and ordered them to perform Warp rituals using mortal slaves.
• The Inductii slaughtered the slaves, and their blood and souls empowered the Warp corruption spreading through the fortress.
• Maloghurst summoned daemons and commanded them to possess the Inductii, turning the warriors into Blessed Sons of the Sixteenth Legion.

Horus signed a pact with Vashtorr, then helped him sacrifice a hive world's population so Vashtorr could forge the daemons' souls into weapons and armor for the Sons of Horus. The Legion gained terrifying new power as Horus prepared his sons to serve his cause.

• Horus accepted Vashtorr's pact after Vashtorr acquired the Blackstone Fortress, binding them to the agreement through the Warp.
• Horus reassured Abaddon that the daemons aboard the Vengeful Spirit were temporary allies, then ordered the Astartes to remove their armor and surrender their weapons.
• Abaddon arranged for Apothecaries and Dark Mechanicum sages to cut away the mutations spreading through the Sons of Horus.
• Horus seized a rebel hive world whose inhabitants had enjoyed months of peace, then unleashed daemons upon them as an offering to Vashtorr.
• Vashtorr forged the sacrificed souls and daemons into the Sons of Horus' weapons and armor, greatly increasing their power.

Jaghatai Khan, Sanguinius, and Lion El'Jonson coordinated their advance through the Beta-Garmon Cluster while Horus remained hidden. The loyalist forces pressed toward the cluster’s core, leaving Lion waiting for Horus’s expected decisive strike.

• Jaghatai asked Sanguinius whether his visions had revealed anything, and Sanguinius said his prophecies had grown less accurate since his return from Macragge.
• Jaghatai reassured Sanguinius that the future was changing and that their choices still mattered.
• Lion continued to hold the largest Imperial fleet in reserve while Jaghatai raided Horus’s territory and Sanguinius integrated more than thirty Titan Legions.
• Sanguinius described the difficulty of uniting the Titan Legions as they advanced toward the traitor-held core of Beta-Garmon.
• Lion reviewed the heavy fighting awaiting Sanguinius on Delta-Garmon II and Beta-Garmon II, but kept his own forces in position because Horus’s main fleet remained unseen.
• Lion wondered what Horus was waiting for and warned that the loyalists’ capture of Beta-Garmon II and III would close the cluster to him.

Sanguinius reflected on the dangers facing Horus and worried about his sons’ future as he taught Azkaellon that the Blood Angels must protect humanity. He then prepared to lead the fleet to Beta-Garmon II for the final battle against the traitors.

• Sanguinius worried that Horus’s inner turmoil could make him lose control and wondered how Raldoron’s rescue mission on Gamma Minor Garmon was progressing.
• Sanguinius told Azkaellon that the Blood Angels must defend humanity, honor their mortal origins, and remain humble.
• Sanguinius feared that after his death, the Blood Angels might succumb to the Red Thirst and return to their brutal past.
• Azkaellon said he wanted only to remain beside Sanguinius and protect him, and Sanguinius accepted his devotion.
• Sanguinius ordered the fleet to Beta-Garmon II and declared it the site of the Mechanicum’s final battle against the traitors.

Raldoron led the Blood Angels to liberate Minoris Garmon 147 from the Death Guard, whose weapons had poisoned the agricultural world and left its people starving. As the Blood Angels began their orbital assault, farmer-turned-militiaman Calvin waited in a trench, weakened by hunger and despair.

• Raldoron surveyed Minoris Garmon 147 and resolved to rescue its surviving people, condemning the Death Guard’s destruction of the world.
• Raldoron and Kano reflected on how the Blood Angels sought to change their harsh homeworld rather than glorify suffering.
• Raldoron led a thousand Blood Angels in a rapid orbital drop assault against Death Guard forces occupying the planet.
• Calvin endured hunger in a trench and recalled how chemical attacks had poisoned the soil and water, killing civilians who tried to eat or drink.
• Calvin learned that many women, children, and elderly people had starved to death despite living on an agricultural world.

Carl fought as a starving militiwoman against plague-walking corpses and Dark Mechanicus forces, finding courage in prayer to the God-Emperor. After taking up a Solar Auxilia veteran’s flamer and surviving its blast, she saw Imperial reinforcements arrive as the Blood Angels descended.

• Carl took position in the trench and fired her lasgun at the approaching plague-ridden corpses, recharging its power pack over a fire when it ran dry.
• Carl prayed to the God-Emperor and felt her fear lessen as the first wave of walking corpses fell.
• Dark Mechanicus slave soldiers, Knights, and armored vehicles attacked, and artillery destroyed the loyalist Sicaran tanks and a Solar Auxilia veteran beside Carl.
• Carl feared she had been infected, grabbed the fallen veteran’s promethium flamer, and burned nearby enemies before its detonation threw her into the gravel.
• Carl heard her comrades announce that Imperial reinforcements had arrived and that the Blood Angels were there.

The Blood Angels arrived in force to reinforce the beleaguered Imperial defenders, and Raldoron led their assault against the Death Guard. Zadar Krosius withdrew his outnumbered troops to defensive positions as the defenders prepared to advance alongside the newcomers.

• Zadar Krosius ordered the Death Guard to fire anti-aircraft guns and missiles at the Blood Angels’ drop pods.
• Raldoron’s drop pods used missiles and evasive flight to avoid the Death Guard’s fire and descend safely.
• Krosius judged that his seven tactical squads could not defeat the arriving Blood Angels and ordered a withdrawal under cover of the Desolate March Auxilia.
• The Blood Angels landed, sterilized their landing zones, and Raldoron led the charge with his jump pack.
• The Imperial militia and Solar Auxilia cheered the Blood Angels’ arrival and moved to encircle the retreating Death Guard.

Crosius and the Death Guard accepted the Warp power in Horus's daemon-possessed armor, transforming into plague-ridden warriors devoted to Grandfather. As they charged the approaching Blood Angels, Raldoron warned his troops that the Death Guard had fallen completely to Chaos.

• Crosius led the Death Guard back to their defensive position and ordered them to form ranks as the Blood Angels approached.
• The daemon-possessed armor fused with the Death Guard's bodies, spreading sores and blisters while increasing their size and strength.
• Crosius heard a colossal being bless the Death Guard, then called it Grandfather and felt his pain disappear.
• Crosius ordered the mortal auxilia to hold back the Solar Auxilia while the Death Guard charged the Blood Angels.
• Nurglings emerged across the battlefield as Raldoron landed and warned his Blood Angel Guard that the enemy's Warp power had spiraled out of control.

Crocius and the Death Guard advanced with swarms of Nurglings, whose plague devastated the Solar Auxilia and Imperial militia. As the daemons and Death Guard attacked the Blood Angels, Raldoron identified their corrosive threat and led a counterattack, though the enemy’s sorcery made them increasingly resilient.

• Crocius found himself drawn to the Nurglings, but kicked one away when it nearly pulled the pin on his grenade.
• The Nurglings overwhelmed the Solar Auxilia and Imperial militia, infecting Calvin’s comrades with a plague that killed and ruptured their bodies.
• Mucani Kano recognized the Nurglings’ plague as psychic and led Blood Angel Librarians in an attack on the Death Guard.
• Kano discovered the Death Guard could regenerate after devastating injuries, while their attacks corroded the Blood Angels’ adamantium armor.
• Raldoron warned the Blood Angels about the corrosive fire, then used a melta grenade to open a gap and led the Sanguinary Guard in a flanking attack.

Raldoron led the Blood Angels against the unnaturally resilient Death Guard and confronted their commander, Crozius. He killed Crozius despite the Death Guard’s Warp-enhanced regeneration, then prepared to give the fallen traitor a final death.

• Raldoron and the Blood Angels fought through the Death Guard, whose bodies rapidly regenerated from bolter wounds.
• Raldoron used melta grenades to destroy one Death Guard warrior, while Kano and other Blood Angels battled the enemy and Nurglings.
• Seeing the Blood Angels’ advance falter, Raldoron took to the air and identified Crozius as the enemy commander.
• Crozius blocked Raldoron’s attack and unleashed a psychic shock, but Raldoron resisted and severed half his body with his power sword.
• Raldoron told Crozius that the Blood Angels’ strength came from Sanguinius’s blood and killed him with a precise strike.
• As Crozius’s body continued to regenerate, Raldoron raised Angel’s Sword to finish him.

Raldoron and the Blood Angels withdrew when a Great Unclean One overwhelmed the battlefield, then destroyed it with orbital bombardment from the Red Tear. They left the corrupted planet to be purged, while Kano revealed that surviving Death Guard had escaped through the Warp and would fight again.

• Raldoron recognized the Great Unclean One as it appeared and watched it devour the wounded Death Guard leader Crozius.
• After Kano asked what they should do, Raldoron ordered the Blood Angels to retreat and requested an orbital strike from the Red Tear.
• The Red Tear’s light lance pierced the Great Unclean One’s barrier, and the fleet’s weapons and Thunderhawks destroyed the daemon.
• Raldoron ordered the fleet to bombard the corrupted planet and explained to Kano that the mortals could no longer be saved.
• Librarian Kano divined that the surviving Death Guard had escaped through the Warp, and Raldoron realized they would return with daemon-possessed weapons.

After the Blood Angels destroyed the enemy and contaminated battlefield on Minoris Garmon 147, Raldoron urged General Thundike Roy to evacuate the planet. Thundike refused to abandon his home but entrusted its children to Raldoron, who marked the world as a death world and departed for another campaign.

• Raldoron met General Thundike Roy after the Blood Angels' orbital bombardment had destroyed the battlefield and left a vast scar on Minoris Garmon 147.
• Raldoron told Thundike that the planet was contaminated, would receive no further reinforcements, and should be evacuated.
• Thundike refused to leave the home his people had defended for six years, and Raldoron accepted his choice without punishment.
• Thundike asked Raldoron to take Minoris's children away so they could have a future elsewhere.
• Raldoron took the children under fourteen aboard the Red Tear, ordered Kano to mark Minoris Garmon 147 as a death world, and led the fleet toward its next campaign.

Raldoron ordered the Blood Angels to protect Minoris’s orphaned children and considered expanding recruitment as the Imperium’s forces advanced through Beta-Garmon. The Vengeful Spirit appeared west of the cluster, prompting the Imperial fleets to converge for a decisive battle against Horus.

• Raldoron told the mortal officials to care for Minoris’s orphaned children and suggested that promising candidates could try to become Blood Angels aspirants.
• Raldoron discussed the Ultramarines’ broad recruitment practices with Kano and warned that Horus remained dangerous despite the traitors’ setbacks.
• An astropath reported that Horus’s flagship, the Vengeful Spirit, had appeared west of Beta-Garmon and that Jaghatai Khan had engaged its forces.
• Raldoron ordered the Blood Angels to change course and join the battle as Lion El’Jonson mobilized the Imperial forces to converge on Horus.