Chapter Summaries

Lox learned that Lady Euten and Orpheo Cassandra wanted Guilliman to become Regent and establish a Second Imperium to unite the Five Hundred Worlds, while he quietly became a tacit supporter of their political faction. He returned to Mustafar, where Star-pattern power armor advanced and Fabricator Locum Bakr Dillen welcomed the planet’s forbidden technology as a loyal Imperial resource.

• Lady Euten argued that Guilliman should put the Five Hundred Worlds’ interests first, while Orpheo supported him becoming Regent of the Imperium.
• Lox warned that a Second Imperium could look like rebellion, but Lady Euten judged his lack of attachment to the Emperor as tacit support for her plans.
• Lox left Macragge for Mustafar, expecting the Five Hundred Worlds’ calm to give way when its people pushed Guilliman toward greater power.
• Over two years, Lox oversaw Mustafar’s production base as its fourth-generation Star-pattern power armor and many variants replaced emergency equipment.
• Magos Bakr Dillen praised Lox as a steadfast loyalist and brought Mechanicus research materials to Mustafar.
• Lox allowed Dillen and his tech-priests to study Mustafar’s forbidden technology and establish a presence there.

Lox advanced his anti-Psyker research after Magos Dylan reported that the Mechanicus had found 223 Untouchables across 51 planets. After learning how Dulles Van Lentin had gathered and protected other Untouchables in a hive-city gang, Lox summoned him to Mustafar to discuss his unusual abilities.

• Lox reviewed the new Star-pattern power armor variants and discussed Guilliman’s efforts to develop a more adaptable military structure.
• Magos Dylan reported that collection teams had found 223 Untouchables, and Lox explained why he had prioritized defenses against daemons and Warp corruption.
• Dylan described the Mechanicus’ limited understanding of Untouchables and explained that cloning had failed to reproduce their traits.
• Dylan told Lox that Dulles Van Lentin had become a gang leader and gathered thirteen Untouchables, using their combined soulless fields to win gang fights.
• Lox ordered Dulles brought to his laboratory and felt growing physical revulsion as the Untouchable approached.

Dulles recounted how the Adeptus Mechanicus took him and his fellow untouchables from Ronde’s underhive and brought them to their vessel. Lox explained that untouchables were rare and valuable because they were born without souls, leaving Dulles horrified by what that meant after death.

• Dulles described his life in Ronde’s underhive, where he became the godfather of a gang of untouchables.
• The Adeptus Mechanicus captured Dulles and his group, then took them aboard an exploration vessel and provided them with food, water, and medicine.
• Lox met Dulles and explained that the search across the Five Hundred Worlds had found only a little over two hundred untouchables.
• Dulles learned that untouchables were born without souls and became horrified at the thought that nothing awaited them after death.

Lox told Dulles that he and the other Untouchables had been conscripted by Roboute Guilliman to fight Psykers and daemons alongside Space Marines. He demonstrated specially adapted power armor that could carry Dulles through battle at a Space Marine’s pace.

• Lox explained that the Warp could make having no soul an advantage and offered Dulles a cigarette to ease his tension.
• Lox told Dulles that the citizens of the Five Hundred Worlds had been conscripted and that the Untouchables would form a unit dedicated to countering Psykers.
• Nykona Sharrowkyn emerged from concealment and questioned how the Untouchables could keep up with Space Marines.
• Lox presented Dulles with specially made power armor that sealed around him and filled with life-support nutrient fluid.
• The armor’s vector engines carried Dulles after Nykona as the Raven Guard warrior launched into the sky.

Lox tested experimental power armor that used blanks to disrupt enemy Psykers, then reflected with Nykona on the Raven Lord and the loyalists’ isolation under the Ruinstorm. Guilliman summoned Lox to Macragge, where anxiety and grief weighed on the capital.

• Lox tested Dulles in experimental armor, using Nykona’s high-speed flight and maneuvers to assess how the blank endured battlefield deployment.
• Lox explained that Dulles’s role was to reach a target under armor protection and create a psychic vacuum, while he rejected the Mechanicus plan to turn blanks into anti-psychic materials.
• Lox and Nykona walked through an artificial forest, and Nykona worried that he did not know whether Corax had survived the fighting on Isstvan V.
• Guilliman summoned Lox to Macragge, and Lox traveled there with Nykona and Hill.
• Lox noticed that the capital’s soldiers and people were burdened by the Shadow Crusade’s losses and the isolation caused by the Ruinstorm.

Lox met with Guilliman and Librarian Titus Praetor to investigate reports of ghostly sightings across Macragge City. After finding no evidence of psychic activity, Lox began a physical survey and waited with Guilliman at a haunted location, where something appeared as night fell.

• Lox learned that Marius Gage was still pursuing Chaos remnants across the Five Hundred Worlds and that Orpheo Cassandra had returned to Amatara.
• Praetor told Guilliman and Lox that people across Macragge City had reported ghosts, footsteps, voices, and laughter at night, but the Librarians, Astropaths, and Mechanicus had found no psychic traces.
• Lox began scanning the inner court with instruments assembled from his wristband while discussing Guilliman's decision to rebuild the Librarius and train the Ultramarines' Psykers.
• Lox reassured Guilliman about his burdens as Imperial Regent, and Guilliman thanked him.
• Lox and Guilliman kept watch in a room where ghosts had been sighted, and Lox announced that something had arrived.

Guilliman and Lox investigated brief spectral voices and footsteps, concluding that an unknown quantum resonance—not psychic power—had caused the apparitions. Guilliman then gave Preator a copy of Hamlet and encouraged him to learn from Lox, leaving the Chief Librarian eager to seek wisdom from humanity’s ancient past.

• Guilliman and Lox detected faint music, voices, and footsteps, while Lox found that the apparitions coincided with an unknown quantum resonance.
• The spectral manifestations vanished after about thirty seconds, and Guilliman ended the investigation for the time being.
• Lox reflected on King Konor and Lady Yuton’s influence in shaping Guilliman into a rational ruler.
• Guilliman asked Preator about the Librarius’s reading and urged him to study classic works beyond psychic power and war.
• Guilliman gave Preator a data-slate containing Hamlet and introduced Lox as a human from Shakespeare’s era.
• Preator bowed to Lox and welcomed the chance to learn from someone who had witnessed ancient history.

Guilliman saw a lone star pierce the Ruinstorm and wondered whether it was a warning or summons. After Lady Yutun reported the specter’s return, he investigated its appearance in the hydroponic gardens and followed the sound of a psaltery toward the presence he believed was hidden there.

• Guilliman noticed a bright star in the eastern sky, recorded its position, and considered whether it carried a message from one of his brothers or the Emperor.
• Lady Yutun told Guilliman that the specter had appeared again, and he hurried with her and the guards to the hydroponic gardens.
• Krennat told Guilliman that he had heard unfamiliar music and seen a tall shadow wearing old Mark-pattern power armor.
• Lox found no psychic energy in the gardens, and Guilliman took Praetor Titus’s bolter before entering alone.
• Guilliman followed the growing sound of the psaltery and its strange echo, sensing that the target he had pursued lay among the vegetation.

Guilliman learned that Barabas Dantioch had activated the Pharos on Sotha, enabling communication across half a sector. He entrusted Dantioch with protecting the installation and asked Lox to discover how it worked, leaving the Five Hundred Worlds hopeful for a way to communicate across the Ruinstorm.

• Guilliman and his followers encountered Dantioch’s image in the Macragge garden, and Dantioch revealed that he was communicating from Sotha through the Pharos.
• Dantioch explained that his team had synchronized the Pharos after weeks of tests, allowing it to transmit his image and voice across half a sector.
• Guilliman praised Dantioch’s achievement and charged him with protecting the Pharos installation on Sotha.
• Guilliman announced that the Pharos could help illuminate the galaxy, and the gathered guards and Victors cheered for Guilliman and the Five Hundred Worlds.
• Guilliman asked Lox to determine how the Pharos worked, and Lox agreed to help.

Lox and his companions reached Sotha after a dangerous journey through the Ruinstorm and met Dantioch and the Ultramarines stationed there. They arrived at the Pharos caves to investigate the mysterious device, while the Ruinstorm continued to isolate the Five Hundred Worlds.

• Lox piloted the Red Alert through the Ruinstorm and brought his party to Sotha, where they descended from orbit to meet the 199th Company.
• Arcus welcomed Lox, and Dantioch greeted him before refusing the new Staa-pattern power armor Lox had brought.
• Dantioch led Lox and the others through the stormy mountains toward the Pharos site and explained that the Warp storm had nearly cut off travel and communication across the Five Hundred Worlds.
• Lox praised Dantioch as steel forged through hardship, and Dantioch declared himself the true Iron Warrior.
• Lox surveyed the vast, spiraling Pharos caves and sent drones inside to explore them.

Lox and Dantioch explored Pharos and activated its ancient quantum pulse engine, linking it to Guilliman on Macragge. After analyzing the relic’s data, Lox identified Pharos as a Necron ruin.

• Lox and Dantioch examined drone surveys of Pharos and built metal walkways into its smooth, twisting caverns.
• Dantioch led Lox to Primary Position Alpha and activated the quantum pulse engine.
• Pharos connected the cavern to Guilliman’s hydroponic garden on Macragge, while its pulse suppressed Warp disturbances.
• Lox used nanobots and the Red Alert’s database to analyze the relic and recognized its technology as Necron.

Lox explained that the Necrons were an ancient race of living-metal beings who had slept for tens of millions of years, alarming Dantioch and Guilliman’s Ultramarines. At the Pharos, Lox began deploying a complete STC to scan and analyze the device, while explaining that STCs originally included guiding AI and extensive databases.

• Lox told Dantioch that humanity had discovered traces of Necrons in ancient tombs, describing their self-repairing living-metal bodies and advanced weapons.
• The Warsmith questioned whether the Necrons could still be alive, and Lox explained that they had likely slept in buried tomb worlds or extradimensional spaces.
• Lox said that astronomical disasters dating back roughly sixty million years might have been caused by the Necrons, leaving the Warsmith and Guilliman’s Ultramarines silent.
• Lox contacted the starship in orbit and had a specialized analytical STC brought by Scythe vehicle to Alpha, the Pharos’s primary location.
• Lox activated the STC and explained to Dantioch that a complete STC included a guiding AI and database, unlike the incomplete templates humanity had recovered.

Lox completed the scan of the Pharos device on Sotha, unaware that it had sent a signal awakening the Necron tomb world. The Necron ruler ordered warriors to kill the humans who were examining its technology.

• Lox and Dantioch waited for the Pharos scan to finish while Arcus and his Ultramarines guarded the installation.
• Dantioch worried that the Emperor might be dead, and Lox argued that humanity should not depend on the Emperor and criticized his treatment of Angron and Leman Russ.
• Lox finished scanning the Pharos quantum pulse engine.
• The completed scan sent a hidden signal that awakened Canoptek Scarabs, Tomb Stalkers, Tomb Spyders, Crypteks, and other Necrons on Sotha.
• The Necron ruler ordered a Cryptek to send Necron Warriors to kill the humans who had disturbed the tomb world.

Dantioch activated the Pharos, sending its light through the Ruinstorm and guiding lost ships toward Macragge. The activation awakened Necrons in the Blackstone tunnels, where they attacked Lox, Dantioch, and the Ultramarines.

• Dantioch operated Alpha Prime and activated the Pharos, whose pulse reached the Macragge system.
• The Pharos beacon pierced the Ruinstorm, and isolated ships and fleets began heading toward Macragge.
• Necrons emerged from rifts in the Blackstone tunnels and received orders to kill the intruders.
• Hill detected the approaching Necrons, and Lox warned the Space Marines to take cover from their Gauss weapons.
• The Ultramarines engaged the Necrons with bolters, and Hill identified their strong defenses, slow movement, and accurate fire.

The Space Marines fought off a squad of Necron warriors and learned that melta bombs could destroy their living-metal bodies. After the battle, Lox examined an intact Necron head as the group prepared to withdraw with the corpses for study.

• A Necron volley overwhelmed an Ultramarine's shield and armor, killing him, while Hill identified the Necrons' limited intelligence as a weakness.
• Nykona scouted the Necron formation, observed signs of corrosion and poor movement, and hurled melta bombs into its ranks.
• The melta bombs melted several Necrons, and Nykona beheaded a damaged warrior before the Ultramarines finished off the rest with bolters, plasma weapons, and melee weapons.
• Lox examined an intact Necron head and noticed minute corrosion marks as Dantioch handed it to him.
• Lox said the group would withdraw with the Necron corpses and study them for useful information.

Lox and his allies examined a Necron warrior and learned that it had once been a Necrontyr civilian transformed into a metal skeleton through biotransference. With the Necrons' awakening still uncertain, Lox ordered preparations for battle on Sotha, but the Ultramarines refused to abandon their post.

• Lox connected a Necron skull to the Scythe's processor and extracted fragments of its memories.
• Lox learned that the warrior had once been a Necrontyr farmer whose body, memories, and self-awareness had been stripped away through biotransference.
• The Warsmith examined a Necron gauss flayer and explained that its rays could dismantle matter at the atomic level.
• Lox warned that the Necrons might awaken again and ordered Sergeant Arkus to prepare the Ultramarines on Sotha for defense and evacuation.
• Sergeant Arkus refused to leave, citing Roboute Guilliman's orders to defend Sotha and the Pharos facility.
• Lox ordered his group to prepare for battle, and the Warsmith declared that the Necrons would pay dearly to take their fortress.

Trazyn the Infinite took control of a Cryptek on Sotha and manipulated a deranged Necron Overlord into sending Immortals and Destroyers after the humans instead of Deathmarks. He prepared to collect the historical figures on the planet, including Lox, and watched the Necron forces advance on the evacuating humans.

• A confused Necron Overlord ordered Deathmarks to attack the humans, but the Cryptek redirected it to send Immortals and Destroyers.
• The Cryptek entered the treasury and stole artifacts while declaring its intention to collect the humans on Sotha.
• The Cryptek revealed itself as Trazyn the Infinite, seized the Overlord's control systems, and returned the ruler to slumber.
• Trazyn lifted the slumber protocols for Immortals and Destroyers and watched them advance toward the evacuating humans.
• Trazyn recalled his long interest in humanity and explained that he had come to Sotha to meet Lox, who had arrived aboard the Red Alert to decipher the Pharos.

Lox and Dantioch prepared the Ultramarines' stronghold for a Necron assault, and the Necron Immortals emerged from spatial rifts to attack. The battle began with heavy losses on both sides, leaving the Skitarii devastated by the Immortals' weapons.

• Dantioch reinforced the camp's defenses while Lox deployed drones and scanning systems to monitor the surrounding terrain.
• Necron Immortals appeared through green spatial rifts on multiple sides of the stronghold, and their electromagnetic interference destroyed the drones.
• Dantioch warned the defenders that the Immortals were disciplined elite soldiers, unlike the Necron Warriors they had encountered before.
• Dantioch ordered saturation fire, and the Ultramarines and Iron Hands unleashed artillery, missiles, melta, and plasma weapons at the advancing Necrons.
• The Skitarii abandoned their positions to fire on the Immortals, who replied with gauss and Tesla weapons that killed many Skitarii even as some Immortals were destroyed.

The defenders of Sotha struggled against the Necrons' resilient Immortals and deadly Skorpekh Destroyers, while Lox uncovered how their resurrection system worked. Lox used a temporal STC template to arm the Space Marines with time-loop bolts, and Nykona's shot disrupted a Skorpekh Destroyer's resurrection process.

• The Necrons overwhelmed the skitarii and withstood the defenders' initial weapons, so Hill ordered the Space Marines to switch to inferno and antimatter bolt rounds.
• Lox detected that fallen Necrons transmitted their data to an intermediate node for resurrection, and Hill ordered Lox and Dantioch to leave Sotha.
• As Immortals and Skorpekh Destroyers threatened the defenses, Lox authorized the Cogitator to produce bolts containing time-loop cores from a temporal STC template.
• Nykona shot a Skorpekh Destroyer with a time-loop bolt, disrupting its resurrection process and stopping it in the path of the advancing Immortals.

The Ultramarines fought the Necrons through close combat and Dantioch’s traps while Lox questioned why the enemy was holding back. A Necron noble appeared in the command room and captured Lox, leaving the defenders without their commander.

• The Ultramarines used time-loop bolter bombs and Thunderhawks to inflict heavy losses on the advancing Necrons, while Nykona Sharrowkyn attacked them at close range.
• Nykona Sharrowkyn and Barabas Dantioch exploited the Necrons’ poor melee skills, and Dantioch withdrew the defenders behind the collapsed gate.
• Dantioch ignited hidden promethium tanks, destroying Necrons in the trap zone, as Hill led the 199th Company into a close-range battle among the ruins.
• Lox noticed that the Necrons had sent only basic forces and wondered why their commander was not using stronger assets.
• A silver Necron noble entered the command room through a pocket dimension, pressed its staff against Lox, and announced that it had caught him.