Chapter Summaries

After Guilliman gave Lox the original Book of Rowell, he ordered the Ultramarines to hunt for Lorgar and the missing Blessed Lady. Interrogations revealed that Lorgar was likely heading to Nuceria to resurrect Angron, so Guilliman led the fleet there to confront him.

• Guilliman gave Lox the original Book of Rowell and said they needed to find Lorgar and the Blessed Lady.
• Marius Gage led the Ultramarines in a half-month purge of Amatra, capturing hundreds of World Eaters and Word Eaters.
• Guilliman ordered Gage to obtain definite intelligence about Lorgar and whether Angron was truly dead.
• Ron Lasus interrogated the prisoners and reported that Lorgar planned to go to Nuceria to resurrect Angron.
• Guilliman ordered the fleet to Nuceria, leaving some Ultramarines behind on Amatra for reconstruction and defense.

The Trisagion carried Lorgar and the surviving Word Bearers and World Eaters through the Warp to Nuceria, where Lorgar planned to restore Angron using the soul he had captured. Khârn questioned the plan and the choice of Angron’s homeworld, but the ship arrived at Nuceria as the chapter ended.

• Lorgar told the Legion leaders that the Ruinstorm had secured a strategic victory, despite the heavy losses at Armatura.
• Khârn demanded that Lorgar explain how he would revive Angron, and Lorgar revealed that Angron’s soul was held inside his Illuminarium.
• Khârn resisted Khorne’s influence and questioned why Angron had to be reborn on Nuceria.
• Lorgar explained that Nuceria was essential to Angron’s fate and that the ritual would take place there.
• The Trisagion crossed the Warp and arrived at Nuceria.

Khârn recalled Angron’s brutal enslavement on Nuceria and learned from Lorgar that a massacre there would summon their father from the Warp. The World Eaters prepared to seize the planet under false pretenses, and their scarlet-armored Astartes arrived at the voidport, where the overseer doubted they were Ultramarines.

• Khârn remembered how Angron became a gladiator, received the Butcher’s Nails, accidentally killed Oenomaus, and led a slave uprising against the High-Riders.
• Lorgar told Khârn that a massacre on Nuceria would serve as a ritual to summon their father from the Warp.
• Khârn ordered the World Eaters to prepare to kill on Nuceria and told Anghkor that the Word Bearers must not interfere.
• Khârn instructed the captain to claim the fleet was an Ultramarines detachment pursuing traitors and acting under Roboute Guilliman’s order to take control of Nuceria.
• Nuceria’s voidport approved the Three Sacred Prayers for docking, and its overseer welcomed the arriving Astartes while noticing they did not look like Ultramarines.

Khârn led the World Eaters to Nuceria and confronted the frightened spaceport superintendent, demanding to know where the planetary governor was. The superintendent led Khârn and his warriors to the Desh'ea Arena, where Khârn expected to find the governor.

• Khârn arrived on Nuceria with the World Eaters and remembered Angron’s abduction and the grief that had left his father hollow.
• Khârn questioned the superintendent, recognized his fear and deception, and demanded to see the governor.
• Khârn suspected Nuceria’s rulers were hiding and blamed them for what had happened to Angron.
• The superintendent claimed he could not reach the governor, so Khârn ordered him to lead them to the Desh'ea Arena.
• Khârn and the World Eaters crossed Desh'ea as locals mistook them for gladiators, then reached the arena.

Khârn discovered that Nuceria’s nobles had branded Angron a traitor and buried his fellow rebels alive, then began a massacre in Desh’ea. As Khârn slaughtered the High-Riders’ guards, a noble offered Nuceria’s friendship and resources in exchange for mercy.

• Khârn had the overseer read the reliefs, which called Angron a traitor and coward and described the rebels’ burial beneath the arena.
• Khârn killed the overseer, and the World Eaters began slaughtering the inhabitants of Desh’ea.
• Khârn led the World Eaters through the arena, killing nobles and their Household Guard while leaving the gladiators unharmed.
• Khârn tore apart a Household Guard wielding silvervine and learned that the implant’s owner was a young boy.
• A protected noble offered Khârn Nuceria’s support, supplies, manpower, and friendship in exchange for a chance to negotiate.

Khârn and the World Eaters massacred Nuceria and turned the Desh'ea arena into an altar to summon Angron. Angron emerged without the Butcher's Nails, but he rejected his sons and grieved over his dead companions and the Emperor's betrayal.

• Khârn killed the High Rider before him and ordered the World Eaters to slaughter Nuceria's ruling class.
• The World Eaters fought the High Riders' forces and relic weapons for eight days, losing eight hundred and eighty-eight battle-brothers as they conquered the planet.
• Khârn turned Desh'ea's arena into an altar with the blood and bodies of Nuceria's dead, and Lorgar used the Illuminator to summon Angron.
• Angron emerged from the blood without the Butcher's Nails, and Khârn realized his gene-father had been freed from them.
• Angron rejected the World Eaters as slaves of the Emperor and remembered that the Emperor had left his brothers and sisters to die on Nuceria.

Angron resisted his resurrection as the Ultramarines pursued the World Eaters, while Legion Master Lhorke warned Guilliman that Lorgar planned to bring Angron back on Nuceria. Lox revealed the Butcher’s Nails’ ancient origins, leaving Guilliman and Lhorke hoping there might be a way to remove them.

• Angron relived the slaughter of his gladiator companions and resisted returning to life as the World Eaters begged him not to abandon them.
• The Ultramarines’ pursuit force appeared, and a salvaged Contemptor Dreadnought identified itself as Legion Master Lhorke and requested to speak with Guilliman.
• Lhorke told Guilliman that Lorgar planned a ritual on Nuceria to resurrect Angron, and explained that he opposed Angron’s return because it would further destroy the primarch and the Twelfth Legion.
• Guilliman praised Lhorke for seeing clearly, while Lox warned that the Warp might let the ritual finish before the Ultramarines reached Nuceria.
• Lox revealed that the Butcher’s Nails were ancient Stone Men life-support equipment and brain-computer interfaces, prompting Guilliman to ask whether they could be removed.

Lhorke thanked Lox for promising to investigate whether the Butcher's Nails could be removed, while the fleet arrived at Nuceria and discovered that Warp sorcery shielded the planet from attack. Guilliman prepared to lead a landing against Lorgar and Angron as Ultramarines began descending through the planet's atmosphere.

• Lox warned Lhorke that removing the Butcher's Nails might be impossible and could not restore lives already lost, but he would search for a way.
• The Ultramarines fleet emerged near Nuceria, where Macragge's Honour detected the Trisagion in orbit.
• Guilliman ordered the fleet and Amatara to attack the Trisagion, but every weapon vanished into a Warp-distorted region around Nuceria.
• Tech-priests reported that Warp energy had isolated Nuceria, while a crimson haze stirred urges toward violence in those who sensed it.
• Guilliman announced that he would lead the landing with the Invictarii and the reorganized Librarius to confront his traitorous brothers.
• Ultramarines boarded Thunderhawks and Stormbirds and began descending through Nuceria's atmosphere under naval cover.

Guilliman led the Ultramarines in a largely unopposed landing on Nuceria, where they found a ruined world and learned that the Warp had weakened ranged attacks and psychic powers. As the World Eaters charged from Desian, the Ultramarines raised their shields and prepared for close combat.

• The Ultramarines deployed drop pods, auxilia, and vehicles around Desian, while a boarding force reported that it could not reach the Word Bearers' flagship, the Three Holy Prayers.
• Guilliman and his Invictarian Guard descended to Nuceria and sensed Angron and Lorgar inside Desian.
• Guilliman saw the blood-covered landscape as hundreds of World Eaters charged from the city, and he ordered the Ultramarines into a defensive line.
• The Ultramarines' ranged weapons and vehicles failed or lost much of their power, while their chief librarians found their psychic abilities nearly useless.
• Guilliman realized that Warp power had distorted Nuceria's rules, weakening ranged attacks while leaving melee weapons effective.
• The Ultramarines raised power swords and storm shields as the disciplined World Eaters closed in for their first assault.

Guilliman led the Ultramarines through the World Eaters’ defenses and reached Desian, where he confronted Angron. Seeing that Angron was free of the Butcher’s Nails, Guilliman hoped to bring him back, but Angron attacked him without explanation.

• Guilliman led the Victrix Guard in a charge that broke through the World Eaters’ disciplined wedge formations and opened Desian’s gates.
• Guilliman entered the city and prepared to face Lorgar or Angron as a giant emerged from the scarlet mist.
• Guilliman recognized Angron and saw that the Butcher’s Nails had been removed from his skull.
• Angron mourned the fallen World Eaters, naming Jochuka, Flet, and Krest, then silently attacked Guilliman.
• Guilliman and Angron clashed with their weapons, and Guilliman questioned why Angron had joined the rebellion.

Angron and Guilliman fought while Lorgar secretly shaped a Warp ritual in Desh'ea. As the ritual transformed Angron into a being of the Warp, Khârn and the surviving World Eaters Librarians tried to stop Lorgar, who insisted that everything was going according to plan.

• Angron accused Guilliman of never understanding oppression and fought him fiercely, but Guilliman wounded him and noticed his blood would not stop flowing.
• Lorgar arrived in Terminator armor and joined Angron against Guilliman while their warriors kept the other Space Marines from intervening.
• Guilliman used his armor’s weapons to weaken Angron and condemned him for his resentment and for turning the War Hounds into killers bearing the Butcher’s Nails.
• Lorgar’s ritual drew the crimson storm over Desh’ea into Angron, and the World Eaters felt their hearts seize with pain.
• Voriah and the surviving World Eaters Librarians recognized that Angron was becoming a Warp being and called on Khârn to help save him.
• Khârn attacked Lorgar, but Lorgar seized him with psychic power and said he was saving Angron and that everything was still going according to plan.

Lorgar completed his ritual to transform Angron into a Daemon Prince, despite Khârn, Rok, and the World Eaters Librarians trying to stop him. Angron emerged as the Lord of the Red Sands, while Lorgar took satisfaction in having made his brother immortal.

• Lorgar restrained Khârn and continued the ritual to summon the Blood God's power into Angron.
• Rok teleported onto the battlefield and bombarded Lorgar's psychic shield, giving Khârn a chance to break free.
• The World Eaters Librarians fused their psychic power and entered the Warp to challenge Lorgar, while Guilliman led his sons toward the landing zone.
• Lorgar tore Desh'ea City from the ground as Warp energy swallowed the battlefield and drew the World Eaters' shadows and souls toward Angron.
• Lorgar released his control as Angron's body and soul were transformed, and Angron became the Daemon Prince known as the Lord of the Red Sands.

Lorgar resurrected Angron as a Daemon Prince, but the transformation erased much of his identity and left him bound to Khorne. After Angron killed the surviving Librarian and destroyed Locke’s Dreadnought, Khârn tried to reach him while Lorgar urged him toward his mission against Guilliman and the Emperor.

• Lorgar told Khârn that he had fulfilled his promise by resurrecting Angron, and Khârn saw that Angron had become a monstrous Daemon Prince.
• Angron failed to recognize Khârn, then turned against the psykers as the Butcher’s Nails returned and Worias attacked him with his remaining psychic power.
• Angron killed Worias and roared for Khorne as the warp storm gathered around him and formed savage armor.
• Locke charged Angron in the Contemptor Dreadnought, but Angron tore the war machine apart and shattered its sarcophagus, killing Locke.
• Khârn told Angron that he was his son, but Angron said he was not Khârn’s father and that Khorne was calling him.
• Lorgar reminded Angron that he was meant to kill Guilliman and help Horus overthrow the Emperor.

Lorgar awakened Angron’s memories but could not free him from Khorne’s control, and Angron charged Guilliman. Lorgar joined the fight on Nuceria, leaving Guilliman battling both Daemon Primarchs as their duel continued.

• Lorgar used his psychic power and Angron’s hatred of Guilliman to restore fragments of Angron’s reason, but Khorne’s influence suppressed his resistance.
• Angron flew toward Guilliman, and Lorgar pursued while Kharn and the World Eaters followed, with Kharn refusing to become a slave like his father.
• Guilliman formed a defensive line, but Angron struck him down and attacked with overwhelming strength; Guilliman and the Ultramarines wounded and restrained the daemon with blades, fire, and explosives.
• Lorgar arrived and used psychic power to devastate the Victors, forcing Guilliman to fight Angron while trying to protect his sons.
• Guilliman attacked Lorgar with the Red Truth dagger, dodged his psychic strikes, and cut several deep gashes into his armor.

Guilliman fought Angron and Lorgar on Nuceria as Ultramarines reinforcements, including Warhound Titans, joined the battle. Angron grew stronger under the Blood God's power and broke free after a Titan pinned him, leaving the fight still raging.

• Lorgar blinded Guilliman with a psychic flash, and Angron seized him and dragged him across the battlefield.
• Guilliman fought back with his weapons and armor, but Angron hurled tanks at him and crushed his leg beneath one.
• Guilliman overloaded his antimatter reactor and struck Angron's Butcher's Nails, then taunted him about his enslavement to them.
• Four Warhound Titans arrived to support Guilliman, battered Angron, and forced him to abandon his attack on Guilliman.
• The Warp storm disrupted the Titans, allowing Angron to tear open one cockpit as his body swelled to the height of a Warhound.
• A Titan named Incinerator pinned Angron beneath its foot, but Angron slowly stood and the fallen Titan was devoured by Bloodletters and other daemons.

Guilliman fought Lorgar and Angron on Nuceria, where the bloodshed empowered Khorne and a horde of daemons cut him off from his Legion. Just as Angron was about to kill him, Lox sent a transforming metal obelisk to intervene.

• Guilliman realized Nuceria’s weakened veil and ongoing slaughter strengthened Khorne, while his growing rage and sharpened blade made him wary of the god’s influence.
• Guilliman nearly killed Lorgar, but Angeltai took the Lightning Claw strike for his gene-father, and Lorgar escaped.
• Angron and Lorgar used daemons to isolate Guilliman from his Legion and attack him, while Kharn held Hill back from reaching the primarch.
• Lorgar bound Guilliman’s leg with a psychic chain, and Angron prepared a fatal strike as Guilliman feared for the Five Hundred Worlds.
• A metal obelisk fell from space and blocked Angron’s claw, allowing Guilliman to escape; he recognized Lox’s voice and learned the object was transforming into a five-meter Iron Man.

Guilliman’s forces drove Angron and the World Eaters from Nuceria after Lox’s Iron Man restrained the Daemon Primarch. Guilliman ordered Exterminatus and sealed the truth about Nuceria, recognizing that the Warp’s danger could not remain hidden forever.

• Lox’s Iron Man analyzed Angron, trapped him in an antigravity field, and wounded him with a weapon that cut through space.
• Angron broke free with Warp power, but the weakening ritual forced Lorgar to drag him and the World Eaters into the Warp rift.
• The daemons vanished, and Guilliman ordered the Ultramarines to return to Macragge while the Iron Man reverted to an obelisk and teleported away.
• Guilliman ordered the recovery of the Titans, named the repaired Warhound Angron Treader, and had the fallen burned because their bodies were corrupted.
• Guilliman ordered Exterminatus on Nuceria and commanded that all news of what happened there be sealed away.

The Ultramarines destroyed Nuceria and set precautions to keep anyone from reaching the traitor homeworld, then began their sublight journey back to Macragge. As Lox and Guilliman reflected on the Ruinstorm and the rebellion, Guilliman mourned the collapse of the Great Crusade’s ideals.

• Guilliman ordered Vortex Torpedoes and Atmospheric Incinerator Torpedoes to destroy Nuceria, then the Ultramarines planted space mines and hidden listening posts throughout its system.
• Guilliman praised the Ultramarines for defeating the World Eaters and Word Bearers, though the Ruinstorm still isolated the Five Hundred Worlds.
• The Ultramarines fleet began its conventional return to Macragge, and Guilliman and Lox shared wine while discussing the aftermath of the battle.
• Lox encouraged Guilliman to speak about his worries, and Guilliman said he feared that many of his brothers had betrayed the Emperor and that a new Dark Age had begun.
• Guilliman mourned the Great Crusade’s shattered promise and the peaceful future he had once imagined for himself and his brothers.

Guilliman confided his fears about his brothers and the Ruinstorm to Lox, then discussed rebuilding Ultramar, restoring communications, and protecting the Iron Men from Chaos. Lox’s stories about the advanced and dangerous technology of his era eased Guilliman’s tension, leaving him more confident that Horus’s rebellion could be resisted.

• Guilliman worried that his brothers might be dead or in danger, and Lox urged him to unite the Five Hundred Worlds and prepare for whichever loyalists survived.
• Guilliman planned to make Ultramar a fallback for the Imperium and asked Lox about alternatives to Warp travel and communication.
• Lox said he could improve communications between nearby systems, though he could not provide another form of faster-than-light travel.
• Guilliman asked whether Lox could guarantee the Iron Men’s safety, and Lox argued that artificial intelligences could resist Chaos and had helped humanity survive the Dark Age.
• Lox described powerful genetically engineered beings and a rapidly adapting monster that the Human Alliance destroyed with an artificial black hole.
• Guilliman felt calmer and reasoned that Horus’s forces would lose their advantage once the Imperium learned of the rebellion.

Lox returned to Macragge with Guilliman and was welcomed by the people before meeting Orpheo Cassandra and Tarasha Euten. Euten thanked Lox for protecting Guilliman and proposed that Guilliman embrace a more radical role as the Emperor’s heir and ruler of the eastern frontier.

• Lox returned to Macragge with Guilliman, whose arrival drew a massive celebration from the people.
• Orpheo Cassandra met Lox, thanked him for helping prepare Amattra’s defenses, and led him through a concealed passage.
• Tarasha Euten thanked Lox for thwarting the trap that threatened Guilliman and asked him to restrain the primarch’s recklessness.
• Lox promised Euten that he would try to stop Guilliman from endangering himself.
• Euten explained that she and Orpheo believed Guilliman should become a visible leader and the Emperor’s heir while the Ruinstorm isolated the eastern frontier.