 We are all subject to the natural progression of life to death. It is our great inevitability, the looming end, the final state to which all mortal lives are careening day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute. It has defined our culture in many ways, throughout the span of history. Ancient phaeronic rulers of lost gyptus raised mighty mausoleums to the sky, monuments that stood millennia after they themselves had passed, their deaths outlasting in their presence the lives that had preceded them. My dreams, what visions that assail me during the depths of my lonely nights have for a while now brought me visions of a world as wondrous as it is strange and horrific. It is familiar yet utterly different and I fear laying my head upon my meager pillow each nocturne lest I be assaulted by yet more of its knowledge. I write these personal records that I may externalize them, rendering them on to parchment so that they may torment me no more, but one finds this journal of extreme importance. For whomesoever may be parley to what lies within know well I have been granted sites that I cannot seem to shift, of a legion of warriors immortal, ones raised by sorceries of death, by that which has seemingly conquered the concept, and now seeks dominion over it in its totality. They are grim reapers, tithe men of a hateful lich god, a revenant thing of foulest malignancy. Now then, this is a record of the Oculus pertaining to the realms of my dreams, and of the bone made hosts of the Great Necromancer, a record of the Ossiarch Bone Reapers. The Ossiarch Bone Reapers are the elite of the armies of death, a legion of perfect soldiers through which the will of the Great Necromancer will be enforced across the entire span of the mortal realms. In need of neither rest nor succour, the Ossiarchs are the finest instrument of Negash's will. They will never tire, they will never relent, they will obey their orders to the very ends of their Ossiath shells. For the god of all death has sought to expand his reach over each and every afterlife that is or will be, and counts amongst his endless hordes close to the sum total of every soul not claimed by Sigmar, the Dark Pantheon, or the sundry other gods that exist within the realms, the Bone Reapers, an extension of the Necromancer's need for an elite, a professional skilled and disciplined force of arms to bolster the numberless, but inherently unstable tides of animated corpses and bewitched skeletons commonly seen where the armies of Shaiish march. Unlike the jerking shambling remains they resemble, the Ossiarchs are not simply bodies raised through Necromancy, but artistically crafted constructs, vessels for similarly fashioned sentiences made and bound through masterfully woven death magic. They are weapons wrought with true purpose, bespoke servants for their dreadmaster, their every aspect tailored to suit his aims. To understand the origins of these malignant constructs, one must first communicate what these restive dreams of mine have revealed to me about their hideous master, Nagash. Ancient beyond the reckoning of any save of few, he was once a man of a desert kingdom lost to both time and space and fire, a being whose relentless pursuit of power over all life and all death saw him become in the world that was akin to a god, and in the aftermath of its destruction achieve this dread apotheosis. During the mortal realms' age of myth, when the realms' fears were still clad in the dew of their creation, Nagash's essence was discovered clinging to a musty barrow by the god King Sigmar in the depths of Shai-ish, the realm of death. Recognizing the being for who he was, the reunion was less than a warm one. But in the spirit that the mortal realms embodied, Sigmar sought to set aside the differences that had once so divided these gods, and invited Nagash to help him fashion these new realities into utopias free from the predations of the dark gods who had destroyed the world of their birth. As part of Sigmar's pantheon of order, Nagash was granted the realm of death as his fife to be its ruler, and for this, and the kindness of the god king in freeing him, the great necromancer bent his powers over death magic to the aid of civilizations everywhere. Tireless dead walkers were the backbone of labour that erected the cities of order, and even the sinister underworlds and afterlives of Shai-ish itself were fashioned into paradises in miniature by the writ of their undying lord. His capital, Nagash's Ar, was a necropolis unlike any other, a city of total deathly order and grand Cyclopean architecture. Sinister, yes, terrifying absolutely, but orderly, tamed, compliant. However, though his fellow deities thought him placated, the great necromancers hold over Shai-ish and over death itself only continued to grow and tighten during the Halcyon days of this last age. To Nagash, death was his to rule. Let the pantheon squabble and debate over the nature of life. He and he alone would control what came after. It is difficult to understate the sheer intensity of the necromancer's desire, nay, need to control death. He truly sees himself as its one soul ruler, that after a thread of life is severed, a soul is his property. To this end, occluded from the gaze of Sigmar, Teclas, Tyrion, Alariel, Malarian or Gorka-Morka, Nagash hunted down and destroyed any spirit or god, no matter how inconsequential, that dwelt within the borders of Shai-ish and may have challenged his rule over death. The afterlives they once presided over were now Nagash's, to submit their due to Nagash's are, lest they face his and its wrath. The Age of Chaos, the sundering of the pantheon of order, both brought the rule of Nagash crashing down, as isolated as he had become during the latter years of the Age of Myth. He betrayed Sigmar, a focus on protecting Shai-ish from the hordes of Archeon, grand marshal of the Apocalypse. Yet even saving his forces from the destruction that befell the god-kings, Nagash could not stand before the dark powers. The ever-chosen's invasion of the realm of death was as devastating as it was total, working no adversary. Archeon cut down Nagash himself before the walls of Nagash's are, his demon army sacking the necropolis in the aftermath. Immune to the deathly magic that would have withered a mortal body into a desiccated husk within seconds, the gibbering hordes of the demonic tore down the works of Shai-ish, sacking in their insanity millennia of Nagash's carefully curated works and feats, leaving it not but a smoldering ruin haunted by the most meager of geists and spirits. Only by the actions of his mortarchs, dreaded lieutenants in mortis, where the great necromancers remains and his spirit given a modicum of reprieve, recuperation took centuries with the god of death brooding in the depths of Shai-ish over his defeat at Archeon's bitterness festered for such an insult to both his power and his pride mandated revenge. But if there is one thing to be said for Nagash, it is that he has nothing if not patient. Cognizant of the grand sweep of possibilities, permitted by his deathly immortality, he was content to lie within the shadows as the dark pantheon conquered swathes of the mortal realms, knowing that by their nature they would inevitably fall to petty infighting. Plans were laid, seeds were planted, schemes whose unfolding would take the span of mortal millennia, for what was such time to a being that had conquered death itself? When Sigmar's tempest finally broke, when the storm cast Eternals brought the god King's liberation to the mortal realms, Nagash was research it, striking at chaos-held Shai-ish in a series of conflicts known as the Barrow Wars. Yet even this conflict, and laterally the Realmgate Wars, both ostensibly for the liberation of the realm of death from the forces of the dark pantheon, served ulterior motives. The collection of massive quantities of bone for the construction of his new legion of undeath, unique, singular, the pride of Nagash's creations, the Ossiarch Bone Rapers. Though seeing their origins far within the depths of the Age of Myth, the nature of the Ossiarch Bone Rapers precluded their involvement in the defense of Nagash's Ar during the Chaos Invasion, or even in the Barrow Wars or the Realmgate Wars that would come much later. The Ossiarch is a finely crafted thing. No mere animated spirits, they know far from it. Each is a necromantic construct of sublime artistry, wrought by skilled hands for singular purpose. Each Bone Reaper is a blended product of many base materials. The Ossius matter that forms their bodies is taken from the remains of many a living creature, human, Dwarden, Elven, Uruk, Grot, Ogre, or stranger and rarer species still. Such matter need not even have sprung from creatures sapient. Certain mortisans, the learned cast of Ossiarch society, have been widely known to display preference for utilizing the bones of animals or monsters for the creation of their new servants, blending into their creations the bestial natures and predacious cunning of the constituent beasts. Just as with form so too with soul, for the life forces that animate these constructs are fouler creations of necromantic magic still. Why, reasoned Nagash, simply utilize one soul when you can wield the virtues of many. The true horror of the Ossiarch is laid bare here. They are not merely the tormented dead shackled to the great necromancer's will, no, they are many people, a myriad each motives and experiences and memories torn from the spirit stuff of the departed, and mixed together through an eldritch maelstrom to form a new unlife. From the dead does Nagash order the harvesting of the best warlike traits, the most salient martial experiences, the richest thinking of military minds distilling each through death magic into the finest soldiers the realm of death has ever known. All else is discarded. The emotions and passions that have no bearing on strategic thinking are expunged without hesitation, for they were mere attachments that cloud judgment and prevent true service to Nagash. This new blended soul is then distilled into a singular crystal of vitrified grave sand, the realm stone of Shaish, to be placed within the core of the bone structure that the Ossiarch will now inhabit. Plucking the correct elements from the myriad of base materials provided to the mortisans has been elevated to an art form by many of their number, but such a practice naturally does take time. The collection of such raw materials is no easy task, and while the Age of Myth was not without its conflicts, the creation of the Ossiarch legions was a painstakingly slow task, or at least would seem so to any without the patience of the great necromancer. Even though the loss of his capital to the hordes of the ever chosen was a loss, it did not cause Nagash to accelerate his plans for his creations, for he knew well the virtue of letting his masterful schemes gestate and ripen for the time they demanded. The Age of Chaos, the Barrow Wars, the Realm Gate conflicts all provided him with the two things his legions needed, bones and souls. Until finally, at the outbreak of the Soul Wars in the aftermath of the Arcanum Optimar, the Ossiarch Bone Reapers were unleashed upon the mortal realms. Contrary to perhaps the popular beliefs of mortals, certainly amongst those who have never encountered them, Ossiarch Society is just that. A society, a culture, sculpted as much as they themselves are, yes, but a culture nonetheless. Its precepts, laid down by Nagash during the Age of Myth, it follows unsurprisingly a rigid and immovable caste system. Flowing down from their mortok, Catechorus, supreme ruler of the Bone Reapers, comes the Emissarian caste, presided over and tutored by none other than Nagash's lieutenant, Arcan the Black. Dedicated to not just the development and perpetuation of the Ossiarch Arts of Death magic, they additionally serve the Necrotopia as diplomats and representatives of the word and will of Nagash when such dealings are called for. The Ossifact caste manages and maintains the great structures of the Bone Reaper and Acropolis, as well as assuming responsibility over individual Ossiarchs destroyed or damaged in wartime, while the Priad caste specifically manages the more specialized military formations, such as the Morgasts or Necropolis stalkers or the mighty Mortec crawler siege engines. Below these lie the endless ranks of the mainstay Ossiarch troops forming the Thorac caste. There is only one direction of movement in this society, and that is down. An Ossiarch is assigned a task and role upon their creation. They are built and designed to fulfill one purpose alone and are expected to immediately and consistently excel. Should they not, demotion is swift and total. Aleige Cavalos, the singular commander of the legions in the field that is subject to censor, is remade in both form and role into a steed for a Cavalos deathrider. Never again to command merely to serve as a beast of burden to bear another Bone Reaper into battle. Indeed, upon this battlefield, the Ossiarchs are the answer to the elite troops of many other factions, a force of singular discipline and coherence that moves as if animated by a singular mind. Their formations have a synchronicity impossible for living things, the baleful light of death magic glowing from within their empty eye sockets, the wrought death grins upon their skeletal visages, never changing. Tight phalanxes of Mortec guard form the bulk of any Ossiarch force, a now all too familiar sight across the span of the mortal realms. In lockstep they form shield wall bulwarks, turning aside the tides of battle until the exhaustion of the foe grants them an opportunity to surge forward and butcher all that lie before them. Discipline never wavers. For each foot soldier of these regiments is bound by the accrued millennia of experiences granted by the multiple lives that form their beings. All self-preservation was torn from their blended souls at the moment of their creation. If ordered to by their hecatos commanders, an Ossiarch will fight to literal destruction. Even the rupturing of their soul gem should that be required for the cause. They will never rout, but rather grind themselves to coffin dust against whatever foe is required. This grim strategic necessity is sacrifice, the tally of losses sustained versus objectives completed. These are the key components of the grand strategy of any Ossiarch campaign. After all, what do these legions need but bone and souls? Should the death toll they enact upon a foe outweigh their own losses by a reasonable degree, but even in defeat, the Bone Reaper Legion has won. This latter aspect is indeed how the majority of those within the mortal realms know of the Ossiarchs. Despite being a fulcrum around which Nagash's military power revolves, it also falls to the Bone Reapers to be the architects of his deathly necrotopia, becoming rule of death over life, the ascendancy of the hereafter. Familiar, they may now have become as the elite forces of death. They are far more commonly encountered by the citizens of the mortal realms as Reapers grim. For the necromancer demands his judes from all lands that fall under his claims. Namely, well, all of them. Nagash is, however, practical. Dominion over all things is of course the ultimate goal, but he knows that the crop of life cannot simply be culled in Weldon fell swoop. Yes, such an omnicide would yield a rich bounty of deathly energies, but just as a farmer does not cull his whole herd for a single gluttonous night, neither will Nagash reap what he deems his with feckless abandon. Rather, the god of all death seeks instead to cultivate, and one of the means by which he intends to swell his ranks, slowly, but surely, is the Bone Tithe. When an Ossiarch legion extends its dominion over territory, or encounters a mortal polity when on campaign, destruction is not immediately meted out. Instead, the army forms ranks in full view of the city walls. Stock still, as only the sinister constructs that they are can manage. As the great and good within fret and sweat and discuss the surely coming calamity, an Ossius emissary will present themselves, seeking to treat with their mortal counterparts. They propose a simple deal. A settlement will provide them with bones, of a quantity precisely measured, and their lives may continue unimpeded. As long as this tax of living remains is supplied upon time, the legion will simply move on, seeking the next city in their ledgers whose payment is either due, or over whom they wish to extend their beneficence. The mortisans who fulfill the negotiations are quite good at their roles, often dedicating many hours to researching the cultures, mannerisms, and traditions of those from whom they wish to extract their tithe, frequently surprising those mortals they encounter with erudite speeches and clearly discernible intelligence. Many who encounter the Ossiarchs expect glassomous horrors from the depths of their nightmares, and while, yes, the Bone Reapers are in aspect and existence just that, their characters belie a depth that they are in fact a culture of their own. Often has a mortal delegation been bitten to rise from their groveling by a voice redolent of the speech patterns their grandparents or departed ancestors used. This latter aspect is in a special quirk of the means by which the Ossiarchs perpetuates the extraction of the Bone Tithe. Centuries mean nothing to these immortal constructs, nor the blended souls that animate them, meaning a mortisan council will frequently return to cities or towns hundreds of years after their first sinister visit and find the language they had once mastered has developed far past comprehension, even past the degree to which the trapped souls within their archive phylacteries extracted in those long past years may understand their own descendants. Should the halting and archaic speech of the mortisans prove unintelligible to these subjects, the solution is simple. One unlucky vassal will simply be killed, finding his soul either stuffed into a now updated phylactory, or worse, its language and history knowledge torn from it and blended into the mortisans own. Such is the price of smooth taxation. Should a subject city or nation be unable to or unwilling to meet its obligations to the Ossiarchs, or should a delegation be attacked during negotiations, retribution is as swift as it is utterly without mercy. While Nagash in his legions may be content to simply tithe and harvest, allowing the existence of the living within death-controlled lands while doing so, they will brook no resistance to the terms they lay out and the terms that they have agreed upon. Any who oppose are simply wiped out, their bones and flesh harvested in totality. The legions will always extract their due one way or another. Their terms are, despite the absolute horror of their content, strictly speaking quite reasonable, although the means by which compliant realms may render them vary wildly across all bone reaper-controlled territories. Many such polities simply do not have a wholly natural attrition rate to meet the tithe in full, and thus must resort to grimmer means of collecting the required quantities of bones. Some practice lotteries or competitive trials to determine who amongst them will simply be slain, offering their deathly overlords in payment their once mortal bodies. Others will simply render onto the bone reapers those venerable amongst them, those who have been deemed to live long enough to surrender their lives that the young may continue to live. Yet more will, when the tithing army arrives, mutilate their own bodies, proffering individual fingers or toes to a great collection pile, reasoning they would rather live thus than kill their own kith and kin to meet the bone reapers' demands. It matters not to the Asiaks themselves. They merely set the terms, agreeing upon in documents bound in death magic and underlined in blood. Renegotiation is not unheard of, but it is deeply uncommon. Rendered only if a nation or settlement has received some unheard of disaster. For again, the Asiaks care little about the extenuating circumstances one may have when one has signed a contract. To them, the mortal herd is to be managed for the meantime, utilized to swell their own numbers through a constant, steady influx of bone and soul. Life is but the brick and mortar that will construct Nagash's Necrotopia, the end state of the mortal realms. It will be an empire of death that needs no food, no sleep, that will persist until the heat death of the macro cosmos itself. The bone reapers are its architects, its tax men, its soldiers, and they will deliver their master's will unto the terminus of all things. They are things of blackest horror, the hatred of the dead for the living personified. My mind still reels that such a culture, such a concept could even spring from the strings of creation. Their sheer frigid chill bleeds through time and space. Those glowing eyes and sculpted rictus grins chasing me from out of my dreams watching, smiling, waiting for the end. I hope that I may gain some measure of rest this night. But I fear I may be unable. Until such a time as my work recording such visions continues. Ave Imperator. Gloria. In excelsis, Terra. And as ever, thank you very much for watching.