Chapter Summaries

Lox and Guilliman gathered the human forces for a final assault on Greenskin Prime, while Lox learned that Dantioch had taken control of a C'tan shard. Kork rallied the defeated Beast warlords, and the chapter ended with humanity’s vast fleet arriving to face the Ork Empire.

• Lox and Guilliman reviewed the victories against the Orks and wondered whether the Pharos earthquake had transformed Dantioch.
• Luther and the senior commanders joined Guilliman’s fleet, and Guilliman kept Luther in command as the expedition prepared to attack Greenskin Prime.
• Lox learned that Dantioch had imprinted his will and memories onto Zahulash, taking control of the C'tan shard, and Trazyn warned that Necron scholars would covet him.
• Kork da Vinci received the defeated Beast warlords, rebuked their arrogance, and rallied them with a declaration that Greenskin Prime would host the final battle.
• The Orks’ Waaagh energy surged across their homeworld as Kork raised their morale.
• Humanity’s enormous fleet, including Lox’s combat white dwarf, advanced toward Greenskin Prime, and Lox steeled himself to face Kork and the Ork gods.

Humanity began its assault on the Greenskin Orks’ heavily defended home system, using a battle white dwarf to unleash spatial rifts that destroyed an Ork Battle Moon. The Orks mobilized to meet the threat, drawing forces toward the front as Lox and Dantioch prepared a concealed strike toward Greenskin Planet.

• Lox praised Adam for defeating a Beast Warlord and urged him to keep improving.
• Sigismund proposed using the battle white dwarf to draw the Orks’ forces forward while Lox and Dantioch deployed a strike fleet near Greenskin Star through dimensional space.
• The human fleet reached the Ork system, and Guilliman ordered the battle white dwarf to test its spatial weapons against an Ork Battle Moon.
• Two spatial rifts tore through the Battle Moon’s shield and fractured the moon, destroying its defenses and devastating the Orks on its surface.
• The Ork warlords ordered their Battle Moons and warships to attack the battle white dwarf, concentrating their forces at the system’s edge.
• Lox and Dantioch prepared to use the Orks’ weakened rear to deploy eight hundred Imperial warships near Greenskin Planet.

Guilliman’s forces used Dantioch’s dimensional space to strike the Ork fleet from behind while the battle white dwarf crushed the Greenskins’ defenses. As human ships reached Greenskin Planet, Krork da Vinci recognized the Orks’ defeat and challenged Lox to meet him in the palace.

• Guilliman entrusted Dantioch with concealing a raiding fleet inside his dimensional space, while Lox prepared to guard against interference from Gork and Mork.
• Lox and Dantioch approached Greenskin Planet unseen as the human fleet engaged the Orks, and Lox observed the immense Waaagh energy surrounding the Ork homeworld.
• Dantioch opened his dimensional space near the planet, allowing human warships to emerge and attack the Ork fleet and orbital stations from behind.
• Guilliman ordered the main fleet to press its attack as the battle white dwarf overwhelmed Ork battle moons, warships, and planetary defenses.
• Lox and Dantioch reached the wreckage above Greenskin Planet, where Krork da Vinci acknowledged the Orks’ defeat and invited Lox to meet him in the palace.

Lox and the expeditionary force met Kork after he rejected Gork and Mork’s blessings and explained why he had abandoned the war against humanity. Kork revealed that he had sent the remaining Orks beyond the galaxy, then challenged the humans to a final duel to decide whether he or humanity had been right.

• Lox and Guilliman refused to bombard Greenskin Prime after its shield fell, and they descended with Vulkan and the expeditionary commanders to meet Kork in his palace.
• Kork rejected Gork and Mork’s blessings, shrinking as he cast off their power and explained that he had chosen to resist their influence.
• Kork told Lox that he had long known the Orks would lose, and that he would not help Chaos or restore technologies that might bring the Necrons down upon the galaxy.
• Kork revealed that he had sent the remaining Orks beyond the galaxy and said the Laughing God had rescued Uslann from him.
• Kork invited the humans to kill him or face his challenge, declaring that he would prove humanity’s strength or show that he had been wrong.

Kork da Vinci died after Lox, Dantioch, Vulkan, and Guilliman stripped away his powers, and the Ork forces across the star system collapsed into disarray. As humanity finished defeating the remaining Ork warlords, Dorn and childlike Perturabo escaped temporal turbulence and arrived on a battlefield, where a figure in cobalt-blue armor seized Perturabo.

• Lox, Dantioch, Vulkan, and Guilliman overwhelmed Kork, whose flesh decayed to ash and left his skeleton beneath a star map from the War in Heaven.
• Kork's death shattered the Orks' Waaagh field, crippling their forces and turning the human fleet's battle against them into a rout.
• Zoe and the Ashen Claws killed Bloodhowl Zack, while rebellious Greenskin boyz beheaded Thomas Edison and burned his head.
• Kork's soul vanished in the Warp, causing a storm that confirmed his death and the extinction of the ancient Orks.
• Dorn and childlike Perturabo escaped temporal turbulence and appeared on a battlefield in the northeast of the galaxy.
• A figure in cobalt-blue power armor grabbed Perturabo as he tried to identify their location.

After Lox and Dantioch stabilized Dorn and Perturabo’s temporal disorder, Dantioch declared that the Steel of Nirvana had severed its ties to Perturabo and the Iron Warriors. Lox proposed accelerating Perturabo’s temporal punishment to send him and Dorn back toward the War in Heaven era, and the group prepared to attempt the journey.

• Guilliman reunited with the time-lost Dorn and child-sized Perturabo, while Sigismund and Dantioch greeted their gene-fathers.
• Lox and Dantioch used their powers to suppress Dorn and Perturabo’s unstable temporal states.
• Dantioch rejected Perturabo and introduced himself as the first Legion Master of the Steel of Nirvana, leaving Perturabo devastated.
• Dorn explained that the Imperium had survived the Ork Emperor’s war and defended Perturabo’s chance at redemption.
• Lox explained that Perturabo’s accumulated temporal punishment could be exhausted by triggering a massive time jump, potentially reaching the War in Heaven era.
• Lox chose Dorn, Perturabo, Dantioch, and Trazyn to make the journey, while Guilliman stayed behind to await their return.

Lox and his companions traveled through time to the War in Heaven, where they witnessed the Ancient Ones’ allies preparing for battle and were brought before an Old One. Qua welcomed them as humans from the future timeline.

• Lox, Dantioch, Perturabo, Dorn, and Trazyn used Perturabo’s spacetime distortion and the ancient Ork remains as an anchor to travel back to the War in Heaven.
• The group arrived on a planet in a galaxy far richer in stars than their own era, and Trazyn described the war’s immense scale and the eventual fates of the Ancient Ones, C’tan, Necrons, and Aeldari.
• Lox and the others watched ancient Aeldari and Krorks build a Blackstone network that removed the veil between the Warp and the material universe.
• Lance and his Aeldari companions found the concealed travelers with a compass and invited them to meet their Sage.
• Lox accepted the invitation, and the group was teleported to a palace where the Old One Qua greeted them as humans from the future timeline.

Lox and his companions met the Old One Qua, who explained the ancient war, treated Perturabo, and answered Trazyn’s questions about the Necrontyr’s origins and the Old Ones’ refusal to help them. As Qua began offering the travelers gifts, a Necron fleet led by a World Engine arrived, and Qua ordered the Orks to prepare for battle.

• Qua welcomed Lox and his companions, explained how both sides used prophecy during the war, and said the future held many possible outcomes.
• Qua recognized Perturabo’s injuries from the Hrud and healed the damage caused by their entropic rays.
• Qua reacted with alarm when Lox showed him the Emperor, then took away the ancient Krork remains and accepted Trazyn’s account of the AllSpark.
• Qua told Lox that the Old Ones had visited another universe and explained why they had refused the Necrontyr’s request for help, blaming them for unleashing the C’tan and worsening the galaxy’s plight.
• Qua said the Primarchs’ time-anchor problem had been mostly resolved and offered the travelers gifts, but Necron warships and a World Engine appeared in the system.
• Qua went to the command center and ordered an Ork commander to prepare for war.

Lox and Dorn witnessed a devastating War in Heaven battle as the Necrons and the Old Ones’ Aeldari and Krork forces fought across a star system. After Khaine drove back the C’tan Ashudra and the system was destroyed, Qua explained why the Old Ones remained to resist the Necrons and Chaos, then offered Lox help with the Webway.

• The Necrons attacked an Old Ones system, and the allied Aeldari and Krork used a stellar psychic array to destroy repeated fleets before the Necrons finally destroyed the array.
• The battle shifted to the World Engine, where Krork infiltrated its surface and Aeldari attacked its facilities, but the C’tan Ashudra arrived and overwhelmed the allied forces.
• The Aeldari summoned Khaine, who drove Ashudra away and split the World Engine, though the system was left devastated and Qua evacuated his surviving forces.
• Qua brought Lox and the other visitors to another system and explained that the Old Ones fought to keep the Warp from consuming the universe, despite expecting to lose the war.
• Lance warned Lox to be wary of future Eldar allies, and Qua offered to teach him methods for constructing and repairing the Webway.

Lox and his companions returned from the War in Heaven carrying the Old One Qua’s Webway knowledge and a crystal that could let humanity control Orks. Back in their own era, Dorn reunited with Guilliman and Vulkan, while Lox called for a discussion about the Imperium’s future.

• Qua gave Lox the knowledge needed to construct and maintain the Webway, urging humanity to continue the fight against Chaos.
• Qua gave Lox a waaagh-energy crystal that could help control the Ork Emperor or let a human command Orks, and explained that Gork and Mork might support the plan.
• Qua sent Lox, Dorn, Perturabo, and their companions back to their own timeline as he reflected on humanity’s possible role in fate.
• Lox and the others returned to the Ork palace, where the Ultramarines and Black Templars gathered around them.
• Guilliman and Vulkan welcomed Dorn back, and Dorn asked them to give Perturabo a chance to atone.
• Lox interrupted the reunion and announced that he had obtained something important to discuss for the Imperium and humanity’s future.

Lox revealed that the Old Ones had given humanity Webway repair knowledge and a potential way to control the Orks, prompting the primarchs to consider Vulkan as the best candidate to wield Waaagh energy. The discussion was interrupted by Malcador’s sudden return, and Guilliman confronted him before allowing him to explain the Emperor’s mission aboard the Emperor's Wrath.

• Dorn ordered the Black Templars to withdraw and rebuked them for ignoring Guilliman’s commands.
• Lox told Guilliman, Vulkan, and the others that the Old Ones had granted humanity Webway repair technology and explained that the Tuchulcha Engine, Ouroboros, and Plagueheart could form a Webway tunneling machine.
• Lox revealed that the Old Ones had given them a way to control the Greenskin Orks, and the primarchs weighed the risks of making an Ork Emperor or using a primarch as the vessel for Waaagh energy.
• Dorn, Perturabo, and Lox agreed that Vulkan was the safest candidate to control the Orks, though Vulkan hesitated to accept the responsibility.
• Lox sensed a Warp fluctuation and attacked the hidden figure in the Ork palace, revealing Malcador beneath a psychic shield.
• Guilliman attacked Malcador in anger, but Lox calmed him, and the group returned to the Emperor's Wrath to hear Malcador explain his absence and the Emperor’s mission.

Malcador revealed that the Emperor had tasked him with recovering Draconyen, a daemon capable of grievously wounding the Emperor, as part of a plan to free the Emperor from the Golden Throne and keep the Dark King contained by creating a God-Emperor. He then joined Lox and the Primarchs in addressing the Imperium’s internal crisis, while Valdor’s mission remained unknown.

• Malcador explained that the Emperor had given his closest agents secret missions to oppose the Dark King, while keeping the Primarchs uninformed because their loyalty could be exploited.
• Malcador summoned a projection of Draconyen, described how it had wounded the Emperor during the Webway War, and revealed that he had recovered it so he could kill the Emperor if necessary.
• Malcador outlined the plan to use the Emperor’s death to gather humanity’s faith into a God-Emperor, balancing the Emperor and the Dark King and allowing the Emperor to leave the Golden Throne.
• Malcador said Valdor’s mission was independent and unknown to him, and explained that he had revealed himself after Lox and the Primarchs defeated the Ghoul Ork Empire.
• Guilliman and Malcador discussed removing Elfreda and curbing the High Lords’ power, while Malcador’s gaze made Guilliman suspect that he might be pushed toward becoming Imperial Regent.

After the Ork Empire’s defeat, Lox and the Primarchs established the Deathwatch and traveled to Macragge, where Guilliman returned to a jubilant welcome. His reunion with his adoptive mother, Lady Tarasha Euten, ended with her noticing his white hair.

• Malcador mourned the failed Webway Project, while Lox argued that knowledge from the Old Ones could help humanity attempt it again.
• Guilliman took responsibility for the Ork homeworld, and the Primarchs approved a campaign to cleanse the Ghoul Stars and let the Ashen Claws remain as its guardians.
• Guilliman placed a thousand Ultramarines under Zoey Shrike and proposed founding the Deathwatch, which the Legions supported with troops of their own.
• Lox, Malcador, Guilliman, and the returning forces traveled to Macragge, where Guilliman arranged a grand victory celebration for the gathered Primarchs and citizens.
• Guilliman reunited with Lady Tarasha Euten, who welcomed him home, placed a victory wreath on him, and remarked that his hair had turned white.

At Macragge’s triumphal ceremony, Guilliman and Lox revealed the captured Beast and chose to preserve it because Vulkan might wield Waaagh energy and become a new Ork Emperor. Qile then presented the Imperial Cult’s crisis to the primarchs and Legion representatives, seeking their support for the Alliance of Light against Alfreda.

• Lady Yvonn reunited with Guilliman and welcomed Lox, then embraced Dorn, Vulkan, and Perturabo during the ceremony.
• Lox and Dantioch displayed the crippled Beast to Macragge’s citizens, while Lox and Guilliman decided not to execute it because it might be useful if Vulkan controlled Waaagh energy.
• The week-long triumphal ceremony spread across Ultramar’s Five Hundred Worlds, and Guilliman’s primarchs prepared to address the Ecclesiarchy’s internal conflict.
• Guilliman and the assembled primarchs and Legion representatives received Qile at the Fortress of Hera, where she described Alfreda’s coup, purges, and persecution of believers.
• Dorn demanded an explanation from Sigismund for neglecting Terra while searching for him, and Lox intervened to defend Sigismund.
• Qile explained that she had formed the Alliance of Light and asked the primarchs and Legion representatives to support it against Alfreda.

Qile won public support from ten loyal legions and the returned Malcador for her Alliance of Light, while warning that war with Terra’s Ecclesiarchy was unavoidable. On Mustafar, Vulkan began fusing with a Waaagh! energy crystal and found himself battling Gork and Mork in their divine realm as the experiment continued.

• Qile revealed the Ecclesiarchy’s oppressive religious taxes, corruption, and brutal practices, persuading the primarchs and legion representatives to publicly support the Alliance of Light.
• Malcador appeared at the Macragge conference and added his support, helping the Alliance’s influence spread across the Imperium as Qile predicted a civil war.
• Lox and the others began the Waaagh! energy fusion experiment on Mustafar, with Vulkan volunteering to bear the crystal despite the risks.
• The crystal overwhelmed Vulkan’s body and drew his consciousness into a boundless green realm where he encountered Gork and Mork.
• Vulkan wrestled with the Ork gods, then tricked Gork into attacking Mork, buying time for the fusion to accelerate.

Vulkan survived fusing with the Old One WAAAGH energy crystal after Gork and Mork tested and blessed him in the Ork divine realm, awakening his Warp essence and a reality-altering power. Back on Mustafar, his presence summoned imprisoned Orks, who recognized him as their Emperor.

• Gork and Mork pursued Vulkan through the Ork divine realm, then poured their WAAAGH power into him after sensing his potential to become a god.
• Vulkan resisted the flood of Ork faith by clinging to his identity as the Emperor’s son and the genetic father of the Salamanders.
• Vulkan awoke in Mustafar’s ruined laboratory with dark-green skin and demonstrated that he could use Orkish “I reckon” power to assemble a working device from scrap.
• Guilliman and the others brought the Beast Warlord and imprisoned Orks to a testing ground, where Vulkan’s summons stirred the Orks’ dormant WAAAGH energy.
• The Beast Warlord and the assembled Orks recognized Vulkan as their Emperor and bowed before him.

Vulkan became the new Ork Emperor after the Beast and the Orks accepted his authority, allowing humanity to turn the Greenskins into allies and a potential weapon. Vulkan agreed to gather the scattered Ork tribes across the galaxy, despite the heavy responsibility and the possibility that Chaos would raise a rival emperor.

• Vulkan's WAAAGH energy altered the Orks' perceptions, and Gork and Mork appeared to the Beast and chose Vulkan as their new emperor.
• The Beast recovered his severed limbs and submitted to Vulkan, while the surrounding Orks also knelt and pledged loyalty.
• Lox persuaded the Beast that humanity could ally with the Orks, and Vulkan promised them weapons, fuel, and ammunition so they could fight endlessly.
• The Beast resisted Lox's arguments before finally kneeling and agreeing to obey Vulkan and live peacefully with humanity.
• Guilliman, Dorn, and Perturabo urged Vulkan to gather the scattered Ork tribes quickly, warning that the Chaos Gods might raise a rival Ork Emperor.
• Vulkan accepted the task of uniting the Ork tribes and forging them into a weapon for humanity.

Lox, Madam Euten, and Malcador discussed Guilliman’s devotion to Ultramar and Madam Euten’s mortal lifespan, then resolved to seek the Cabal’s technology to make her a Perpetual. Guilliman arrived, panicked at the thought of losing his mother, and vowed to search the galaxy for the Cabal.

• Lox and Madam Euten drank wine and discussed Guilliman’s love of governing Ultramar, while Malcador pretended not to hear them as he fished.
• Malcador caught a huge fish and explained that Vulkan had left Macragge to gather the Orks, whose strength could aid humanity.
• Madam Euten told Lox she wanted to face death naturally and asked him not to extend her life with further surgeries when the time came.
• Malcador revealed that the Cabal had used its technology to turn agents into Perpetuals, and Lox and Malcador decided to find the Cabal and use its technology for Madam Euten.
• Guilliman arrived, learned they might be able to prolong Madam Euten’s life, and begged Lox to help her.
• Guilliman promised to mobilize the Ultramarines and Ultramar’s Five Hundred Worlds to find the Cabal by negotiation or force.

Guilliman and Lox summoned Ferrus to meet the Iron Hands and explain why he had not returned to them. Ferrus revealed that his sons had taken his teachings in the wrong direction, leaving the Legion shaken and unsure whether they could change.

• Guilliman asked Malcador to summon Ferrus so he could address the Iron Hands in person, and Malcador used a ritual to call the Bound Legion to Macragge.
• Ferrus appeared before the Iron Hands, who learned that their gene-father still existed in the Bound Legion and knelt in joy at seeing him.
• Ferrus warned his sons that they could not join him by deliberately seeking death, after many of them considered dying as a way to follow him.
• Mel Ayan defended the Iron Hands’ doctrines of competition and mechanization, but Ferrus admitted he had planned to correct those beliefs before his death.
• The Iron Hands realized that the path they had followed for centuries was misguided, and Mel cried out in despair as they wondered whether they could return to flesh.

Ferrus confronted the Iron Hands over their extreme reliance on machinery and ordered them to limit further mechanization, while Lox proposed a compromise using engineered metal cells. Lox tested his new approach on Mel Ahn, whose body began transforming into a living fusion of flesh and metal.

• Mel Aen challenged Ferrus, defending the Iron Hands’ belief that machinery could overcome the weaknesses of human nature.
• Ferrus argued that spirit mattered more than metal or flesh and ordered new recruits to keep their left hands while veterans stopped further mechanical replacement.
• Lox proposed using engineered metal cells to let Iron Hands transform their bodies into metal without abandoning living tissue, and Trazyn supported the idea that neither flesh nor metal was inherently superior.
• Lox developed modified metal cells in Macragge City’s laboratory and Mel Ahn volunteered as the first test subject.
• Lox injected the cells into Mel Ahn, whose damaged body began rebuilding itself with living tissues that combined biological function and metallic strength.