 In this grim future of ours, there is only war. It has evolved in so many ways from the simplicity of old. We've developed new ways, sundry, foul ways of killing. We've cast ships of steel and iron into the void sporting weapons that can scour a world of all life. We have wrought data gin to take the conflict into the realm of the binaric. We even war with our minds, ethereal battles in a new space of pure idea forms. Yet, despite this, the galaxy, hateful as it so often is, opts to make room for the baser modes of strife. To allow war, to be reduced to the horrid bluntness of muddy industrial slaughter, for a planet to be turned into a carnal house of churning bodies, split flesh, and rivers of vitae reddening the salty earth. The type of war where lives are spent as easily as ammunition, where soldiers are as much a line item on a requisition form as artillery shells. One such conflict arose in the latter years of M41, scant centuries ago. One that served a reminder that though we may live in a future far removed from the wars of our past, the world can still so readily pivot to men slogging through a trench, defying choking gases and sucking mud. Only to die, nameless and unmoorned on a world that hates them for a regime that doesn't even care. No then, that this is the first in a series of records concerning this conflict. Of a campaign as infamous as it is now hatefully iconic. The Siege of Wrax. For such an infamous chapter in Imperial history, this particular conflict began fairly inauspiciously, with the long expected death of a priest. Cardinal Astra Borja of the Scaras Sector passed to his emperor grant a reward in 366804 M41 at the age of 400. His natural life having been greatly extended by Juvent treatments that his position had granted to him and others that his personal political power had allowed him to secure more of. A solid and dependable atlesiastical presence in life, the long sweep of his tenure had allowed him to carefully secure for his successor an easy ascension to the cardinal ship. Thus was the position easily and deftly passed to his successor, Zafan, without any of the necessities of politicking or bloodshed. As the bells told, the dearly departed Borja, who it must be noted had not left his seat upon San Ortorus for two centuries, Zafan was enshrined as a new cardinal Astra, with little in the way of any opposition raised from his contemporaries. Borja had been a powerful patron, and Zafan was a capable protege of his tutelage. Keen to minister to a flock he felt had been long deprived of the presence of this highest of religious offices, Zafan declared his first act as cardinal Astra would be a grand pilgrimage to both honour the memory of the departed Borja and renew the faith of the sector's laity. It would appear the new cardinal was not only quite aware of the billions he was now expected to minister to, but also of his own failings in mendicancy, for at no point in his atlesiastical career up to now had Zafan made any pilgrimage to any of the sundry holy sites abroad across Scaras Sector. The revenue Zafan assembled was one designed to not only project the correct heirs of authority and piety, but was additionally a trial run to project his newfound power and influence. Testing the waters, if you will, of just what the cardinal Astra of Scaras was capable of wielding should he set his mind to it. A thousand strong, at least. It assembled not just the requisite deacons, preachers, shantalains, choirs, and sacristans, but in quite a coup for the new cardinal, the detachment of battle sisters from the adeptas Rortas, the order of the Argent Rout, to be precise. Thus arrayed with all the trappings of what was expected of the imperial atlesiarchy, Zafan's pilgrimage began. Five-year arc of the cardinal Astra's tour can be considered, at least initially, a riotous success, in some cases quite literally. In the two centuries since the previous cardinal esconced himself on his throne world, the Scaras Sector had grown somewhat religiously rudderless. Oh, the planetary establishments tended to the citizenry the same as always, with routine services and the everyday generality of purges, pogroms, indoctrination, persisting as usual. The rival of religious leadership, in the form of a soul-touring prelate, was an event that shook the masses out of the humdrum of everyday church-sponsored terror and control, focusing their devotional energies now upon a single soul. Leadership is a tenuously wielded thing, and in Zafan, the flocks of Scaras were presented with a charismatic, and most importantly, new figure in which to vest their worship. It was a sharp rise in fanatical cults, aligned to the Church of the Emperor, yes, but outside its general control. The redemptionists, the largest amongst them, pronounced the cardinal's pilgrimage nothing short of a crusade to rid Scaras of its indolence, its apathy, and its quietly festering heresy, a spiritual renewal of the realm of his Imperial Majesty's domain that had grown fat off years of relative comfort. On Thracian Primaris, the outdoor ceremonies of Zafan grew crowds that numbered in the millions, with crushes and riots killing thousands as the frenzied masses attempted to get closer to his blessed figure, prompting harsh and bloody reprisals from both the local arbiters and Zafan's own Sororitas Honor Guard. Many of these faithful pledged themselves to the cardinal, intending to sell their lives in his service. His entourage fleet rapidly bloated with ramshackle pilgrim transports and tapony bulk carriers, their holds crammed to the brim with the zealous citizenry of the sector. The word of Zafan, spilling from cheap recordings of the slavering lips of thousands of preachers, was a constant background noise on these ships, as persistent as the thrumming of their engine stacks. Their number soon began, too worried eyes, to resemble those of a small army, rather than a mere procession of the faith. It is likely that in this pilgrim hoard, Zafan truly began to see the power of his position and the potential it represented. May indeed have been, initially, from a place of virtue. The council chambers of the Atlesiaco Conclave on San Arturus contained a multitude of responsibilities and work, all of it good and just, of course, but here, amongst the people of the Imperium, Zafan was able to watch his word work wonders. Perhaps in this he saw a calling, or truth, the work of the Emperor made manifest, his duty and his role being fulfilled in a very tangible manner. He was stirring the fervor of the laity with each sermon, his deliverances swelling the tides of the faithful with each passing day. The people were believing with a zeal that had not been seen throughout the sector for literally centuries. Real action was being taken, no presiding over conclaves developing policy or fine-tuning, ignorable declarations. Surely this was good. Surely all was right in the world. The cardinal was recorded to have voiced these opinions to his most trusted advisors, amusing with those closest to him at what these feelings could mean for his new tenure in the office. Most demure. The Atlesiarchy has a tenuous history in this particular regard. Memories of the Age of Apostasy persisted into M41, or rather, the inquisitorially mandated laws in memorial of that particular chapter of Imperial history did. During his reign of blood, the tyrant Goge Vandier had seized the power of both the Administratum and the Atlesiarch, holding simultaneously two seats upon the High Lords of Terra, and ushering in a period of civil war that had not been seen since the Great Heresy. Control over not only the religion of the Imperium, but the faith of its devotees had been crucial to Vandier's power and his rise, leading in the aftermath to sweeping reforms being placed on the Ministerum's abilities to control men under arms. These laws were ruthlessly enforced by a wing of the Inquisition founded to do just that, the Ordo Hereticus. Many within Zafan's retinue quietly feared drawing their eyes at best, or their reprisal at worst. Polite acedents to the Cardinal's wishes was judged by these hangars on to be the best course of action. All save one. Deacon Mamon, the young man recently joined after impressing Zafan during the ceremonies on Thracian Primaris, was favoured by the Cardinal for his forthrightness, and his desire to see this pilgrimage as a force for good within the sector. Mamon openly declared that the pilgrimage need not simply be the simple preaching caravan, which should be actively developed and built upon, but the ultimate goal of becoming a war of faith. Playing to the Cardinal's desire, Mamon declared that Zafan was a great uniter, the leader that the sector needed to bind the various wings of the imperial creed under one banner, the bringer of a great surge that would see the sector scoured of the unclean and the heretical. The concept of a war of faith is not unknown within the Imperium. They are a sanctioned reality for the Adaptus Ministorum, and serve a multitude of purposes beyond their simple military efficacy. The other means by which the Atlesiarchy may galvanize the faithful into action, and by which the Imperium may wield its copious manpower in an effective, if incredibly blunt manner. In purely utilitarian, if horrific terms, there are also the means by which the Inquisition may allow a culling of the more restive elements within imperial religious hierarchy. A demagogue is all well and good until you find yourself the object of their hatred, and wars of faith allow for that hatred to be directed just where the Imperium desires it to be. Outward. The peak of wars of faith is widely considered to have been reached in the Age of Redemption, from M37 to M38, but has remained, strictly speaking, well within the strictures of the Lex Imperialis, although crucially, they must be sanctified and approved by the High Atlesiarch on Terra itself. A great degree of temporal, political, and religious influence is needed to properly secure such permission, and it goes without saying that the process is closely monitored by inquisitors of the Ordo Hereticus for any potential deviancy. It is these eyes that Zafan was wary of drawing, and that caution was actively stoked by Deacon Mamon. One false move he warned, and the Cardinal would be clapped in irons by agents of the throne. There could even be eyes watching him right now, members of the retinue, turned to the pay of scrutinizing bodies, or traitors, seeking to sell the Cardinal Astra out for the sake of their own petty aims. Zafan began to agree with Mamon. His inner circle should be one he could rely upon, trusted individuals, dedicated to his holy path to the exclusion of all else. The current chaos of the constantly shifting orderlies, priests, and sundry functionaries gave the Cardinals enemies, as Mamon began to call them, ample opportunity to infiltrate. If Zafan were to see his heart's desire manifested, if the holy war that Scarra's sector so desperately needed was to be delivered, the Cardinal would need a location, a planet even, secure and safe, where he could plan and prepare. Zafan wondered where could possibly exist such a world. Mamon said he knew of one. Vrax. Located in the Kirak sub-sector of Scarra's, the Vrax system contains four planets, Prime, Secundus, Tertius, and Euryx, of which Vrax Prime is the only inhabited world. Planet was an armory world, under the purview of the Departmentum Unitorum, one of thousands scattered throughout the Imperium to serve as a planetary scale storage facility for the materials the Imperium devours in its endless wars. Ammunition, weapons, armor, artillery, and military supplies of every variety, all stored in the event they are needed for the foundation of new regiments of the Astra Militarum or the equipping of planetary defence forces or as emergency reserves in a time of unexpected need. An unkind world that had begun its life cycle with highly volatile volcanic activity, Vrax has over millions of years settled into its current dormancy. While its tectonic movements were now negligible, the constant churning of minerals had created a crust that, through the millennia, and developed deep ravine canyons as the softer elements were scoured away by sudden and highly severe sulfuric electrical storms, themselves a product of mass ejections of gases during the planet's early life. The high sulfur content had the added benefit, at least for imperial colonisation, of making native fauna non-existent beyond the level of simple single-celled bacteria. Such settlement occurred in the ancient times of the Great Crusade when the planet had been discovered by a rogue trader of the Van Mier dynasty, the name now redolent in the naming of geographic features surrounding the capital. Initially a supply depot for the Great Crusade's expeditionary fleets in the Galactic North, the passage of the Great Heresy and the scouring elevated it in importance, given its proximity to that most hated of galactic regions, the Eye of Terror. The majority of the trader Astartes legions now confined within the storm, the fortification of the Cadian Gate becoming a top priority for segmental authorities, the Adeptus Administratum through the Departmentum Unitorum began the process of turning wracks from a simple forward staging ground into a fortress. Its stockpiles were now contained within a mighty citadel, itself close to a newly constructed spaceport, allowing for the atmospheric landing of the mighty bulk haulers utilised by the Unitorum. All of this was expanded upon and added to as a millennia wore on, with certain periods usually in the wake of, or in anticipation of, the Black Crusades of the Dispoiler seeing massive reworking and updating of the defences taking place. The cycle was a simple one, more storage was needed for more material, which meant more material was stored, which increased the risk of attack, which required greater defensive capabilities, et cetera, et cetera, all overseen by the exacting Eye of the Unitorum, who ran the planet to the highest of standards from within the fortress of wracks. A massive citadel situated in the caldera of one of the planet's many extinct volcanoes. This fastness was a nerve centre of all operations planetside, serving not just as the headquarters of the local defense forces and Adeptus Arbites, but also the offices and archives of the Administratum, the cells and precincts of the local inquisitorial branches, the Astropathic Choir and the Palace of the Cardinal Astra. The fortress was also home to the Basilica of St. Leonis, raised in M38 with the intent of serving as a focal point for religious affairs, of those presiding over the millions of indentured workers serving the Unitorum. These serfs formed the majority of the world's population, some five million strong, with a substantial proportion of these being made up of Ogryn Abhumans, deemed priority for menial labour tasks. The presence of the Basilica drew a sizable pilgrim crowd, between one and five million depending on the season, while militarum regiments could occasionally be present for re-arming and resupply. Generally speaking, the level of defences present on fracks were vastly disproportionate to its population, but completely in line with the amount of arms and armaments it possessed. To the Unitorum, it was essentially impregnable. The Citadel was surrounded by high curtain walls and three ringed defense lines crammed with pill boxes, trenches, minefields, tank traps and enfilades. The fortress itself had multiple inbuilt void shield generators to protect itself from orbital bombardments and enough laser batteries to see off any airborne assault, batteries which could, if needed, fire upon ground targets, covering a 360-degree arc around the Citadel in overlapping fields of fire. It was a masterwork of defensive capabilities, a true testament to the design and dedication of the departmental Unitorum. And it was not to last. According to the enthusiastic Deacon Mammon, the Citadel of Wracks would be the ideal location for the Cardinals' purposes. The Basilica and the Cardinal Palace had not seen the presence of the office for centuries. Saint Leonis had been blinded and martyred by heretics during his own travels preaching the Emperor's word, and his bones, enshrined upon Wracks, still drew large pilgrim caravans. The symbolism inherent in the acts of Leonis, proclaimed Mammon, were ideal for continuing the tone Zafan was seeking to set, as well as being a story that reminded the faithful of the wickedness of the heretic and the apostate. The pilgrims there would be eager in the extreme to hear the preaching of a Cardinal Astra, and doing so would maintain Zafan's fame as a man of the people. In private, Mammon was quick and earnest to state that Wracks was perfect for allowing the Cardinal both ideal time and ideal location to further his plan for his war of faith. As the strict passage requirements surrounding entry, rigorously monitored by the departmental Unitorum, would naturally weed out any potentially traitorous elements from joining Zafan's retinue. The Cardinal was fulsome in his praise of Mammon's plans, leaving the entirety of the logistics in his seemingly perfectly capable hands. Under the auspices of the pilgrimage, Imperial Navy transports were arranged, as were escort frigates. The departmental Unitorum were informed and, while surprised, acceded to the Cardinal's request for residence with little complaint, save for inquiries around the speed at which the atlasiarchal decision had been made. Potential issues with this and with security concerns were ironed out rapidly by Deacon Mammon's silver tongue, assuring the Unitorum that he had all confidence in their ability to carry out any and all preparations in record time, such, of course, being their devotion to the Emperor's Church and its works. A frenzy of action ensued throughout the subsector, as ships were rerouted and astropathic messages shot back and forth, bearing the news. The new Cardinal Astra, the mendicant preacher of Scaras, the champion of the common man, was coming to Vrax, which would now become the true seat of religious authority within the sector. The arrival of Zafan upon Vrax was an event accorded all upon in circumstance, the Unitorum, eager to prove Mammon's faith in them well placed, could muster. The entire garrison of the Citadel was marched out and lined the road to the spaceport in perfect parade order, banners fluttering in the sulfur-tinged winds. The storms, usually redolent of Vrax's atmosphere, kept at bay that day, a sign the more pious of its citizens counted as an exceedingly auspicious one. Zafan's procession was immense, and the crowds of pilgrims in its wake even more so. It seemed quite unlike anything the Armory World had seen in millennia, and after conferring upon the waiting garrison his most sincere blessing, and after a perfunctory meeting with the master prefect of the Unitorum to conclude formalities, the Cardinal retired to the Elysiacal Palace with his inner circle, the grateful and smiling Mammon at their head. Little was seen of the Cardinal following these initial meetings. Contrary to the expectations of both the Unitorum, Fitiates, and the indentured workforces who had heard so many rumors of his willingness to preach, Zafan rarely made any public appearances or addresses, occasionally visiting the shrine at St. Leonis's remains to pay quiet homage, much to the delight of whatever pilgrims were lucky enough to be present in the Basilica at the time. Few were admitted to his presence, those that were and did so only with the permission of Deacon Mammon. The prelate had taken over management of the public face of the Cardinal, assuring inquirers that Zafan was deep in contemplation over matters spiritual, working day and night on behalf of the people of Scaros. Life on Vrax began to return to normal. The workers forgot the Cardinal's presence as their overseers demanded higher quotas and kept up for the time lost by the arrival ceremonies. Administratum and Unitorum officials returned to the daily toil of storage management, shipping manifests and deployment scheduling. The sisters of the Order of the Arjun Shroud, content that their charge was protected by the Fortress and Garrison as much as their own presence, took up residence in the Chancel Priory attached to the Basilica, electing now to be an honor guard to the relics of the departed saint. Days turned to months. Life was regular and all the while, in secret, Zafan labored. The first steps of his war of faith were being laid. He had already elected at Mammon's urging not to dispatch missives to Terra as the urgency this upcoming crusade dictated that such channels would only present an unacceptable delay. A war, of course, would need an army. Zafan already had his core. The militant pilgrims still encamped outside the citadel, awaiting his word, but he would need more. While functionally disallowed from doing so, Mammon had already seen to this. A legal loophole granted to the ministerum by the presence of the Basilica, which, as an imperial holy site, contained sanctified relics and was permitted in times of conflict and threat to raise a Frateris militia in its own defense. By the cardinal's direction, Mammon sent the most trusted of his missionaries out to the work camps and have blocks to spread the word of Zafan. Their sermons began as military tinged rhetoric extolling the virtues of service to the emperor and death in his name and in defense of his realm. From there, they called curses upon the hateful eye that squatted in the skies of the world, baleful and apocalyptic. And finally, they spread word that heretical forces were already abroad in the Scarra sector, pillaging their way from planet to planet and butchering all those loyal to the throne that they could find. Many a preacher invoked the trials faced by the departed St. Leonis, whose torture at the hands of heretics, simply for doing the word of the god emperor, was now being replicated across dozens, nays, hundreds of worlds. Vrax was next, the missionaries swore. Would these workers stand idly by and let it fall? Or would they rise in its defense, pledging their lives to the cause of protecting all that was good and holy in this galaxy? The atmosphere of life upon Vrax was slowly charged until it fairly crackled with zealotry. Open displays of religious fervour became at first commonplace and then expected. Gangs of Frateris militiamen, unarmed, yes, but violent, patrolled the work camps, enforcing the Cardinal's word, or their interpretation of it, whenever they saw fit. Their influence extended over the garrison, granting them legitimacy, and all those who were found to harbour thoughts against the Cardinal or his word were surrendered to the just as sympathetic arbiters, dragged into the depths of the Citadel's dungeons for correctional torture. Within the Cardinal Palace, Deacon Mamon was personally working to establish an inner circle for his master, one that could be trusted to obey the words of Zafan without question. Drawn from the ranks of the Frateris, Mamon selected those with talents or ruthlessness he deemed necessary, creating a fanatical group known as the Disciples. The proximity to power that this group offered was additional enticement to the commanders of the local garrison, who Mamon was quick to flatter and cajole, or even bribe with the Cardinal's vast wealth should the simple appeals to piety prove insufficient. Where all else failed, the inroads that Deacon had now made would allow his sufficient influence to remove the remaining holdouts and have them reassigned or replaced by those amenable to the Cardinal's cause. Eventually, all could be relied upon to heed any wishes Zafan may express. None were under his command in the strictest sense. There was no usurpation of the direct line of command authority. It is true. But in practice, this was merely semantics. Every officer of the garrison was the Cardinals. The only holdout were the local Adeptus Arbites, who had been deliberately excluded from Mamon's machinations for fear of a misunderstanding of purpose, or so the Deacon would claim when pressed. Mamon's work and Zafan's word were working their way through the population of Wrax with stunning rapidity. The laborers of the world drank in the sermons of their supposed champion, grasping for hope amidst a life they knew would be hard, short, and painful. Indentured servitude to the whims of the Administratum, or indeed any branch of the Imperial Regime, is not the worst fate imaginable in this galaxy of ours, but neither is it one that any of us will choose. Zafan, through the ministrations of his preachers, gave them what they had not received, well, ever, recognition. He made them feel that the eyes of the Emperor were upon them. The God of Humanity required their service in ways greater than their limited minds could ever imagine, offering them an escape from the menial drudgery of their existences. That bred a form of devotion that is ordinarily admirable, but quite dangerous should it be turned to wicked means, means which the watchful eyes of the Inquisition were ever wary of, eyes which were now turning upon Wrax. Despite Deacon Mamon's efforts, the Ordo Hereticus had taken note of Zafan's works upon the Fortress World. Word had reached the subsector officiates of the Cardinal's Preachings, and many within the Conclave believed the warning signs were there. Sequestrament, the buildup of power and influence, the development of a close inner circle, the divestment of authority to sanctioned gangs, the encouragement of fanaticism and blind loyalty. These were standard practices of the Ministorum, yes, but only when properly conducted in the open and with deference to the appropriate authorities higher up the chain. This Cardinal was conducting his business seemingly at his own behest, and this could not be allowed to continue. Too often has the Ordo Hereticus been called to put down such prelates of the Atletiarchy, for too many have been unable to avoid the temptation's power has promised them. Curtailment of said, through, let us say, preventative measures, was Hereticus' preferred means to combat such outcomes. Better to nip any potential concerns off the vine lest they destructively bloom. And to that end, a preventative measure was dispatched to Vrax. An assassin of clade vindicare, the purveyors of the finest snipers in the entire Imperium, infiltrated the Citadel with comparative ease. The pilgrim flocks were still descending on Vrax, in greater numbers now thanks to the Cardinal's presence, so despite what they may have initially believed, entry visas and proper ident tagging were not so difficult to obtain, for one with the resources of the officio assassinorum at their disposal. After that, it was merely a matter of applying careful surveillance to security measures, guard movements, and the routine comings and goings to Citadel for the assassin to find the optimum spot to lay his ambush, and then utilize the legendary patience of the vindicare until the opportune moment presented itself. History could have taken an entirely different course, were it not for what happened next. His scope trained upon the Cardinal's palace, the assassin had aspired his chance, and took it. A single shot, a heavy penetrator round pierced the wall and cut clean through a decorative pillar, only to be turned aside when it struck Zafan himself. Although floored by the shot, the Cardinal had taken precautions, his suspicions having grown more acute during his time on Vrax, and had obtained a personal refractor field. His life wards, Frateris Zellitz' all rushed to protect him, with two more of their number being pulped by repeated rounds from the vindicare operative. Had they not, it is possible that their refractor field would have collapsed under the assault. But that moment never came to pass. The assassin had missed his shot, against all odds, and knew he must exfiltrate immediately. The citadel erupted as word of the attack spread. Treachery, treachery was here at last, the heretics had struck, the Cardinal saved by a miracle, and now was the time for the faithful to prove their worth. Despite his best laid plans, the escape route of the vindicare was swarmed by frenzied acolytes, forcing his hand and his quiet departure to turn hot. The chase took him and his pursuers through the depths of the citadel, into the vaults of the Basilica itself, shots blasting to and fro between hunters and hunted. Cornered, the guards were able to shower enough grenades at the assassin to disable him before finally killing the operative in a hail of bullet fire, at the cost of dozens of their own. Regardless, the security forces of Rax had succeeded, and the body of the Cardinals would-be killer was dragged above ground for public display, lest anyone harbour doubts of the attack, or possess any ideas of defying the great Zafan. Matters worsened, and rapidly. The kin to a hive of insects that had been disturbed, furor gripped the citadel as all the worst fears of the faithful were apparently manifesting before their very eyes, fears they had been conditioned to expect. Rioting spread from the citadel throughout the labour camps to the starport. Frateris Militia demanded access to the armories. To arraign themselves for a battle they knew would soon be hence, and the garrison under deacon Mamon's direction threw open the doors for them. Weapons and ammunition were showered upon the pilgrims, seized upon any and all supplies they could. The Arbiter's attempts to restore order were utterly futile, with the citadel branch soon finding itself besieged by mobs of Frateris now armed to the teeth. It did not stop there. Militia men moved out of the citadel and into the industrial zones. Everywhere the workers of Rax ceased production and threw down their tools, rising up against their overseers at the extolling of Zafanite preachers in their midst. Desperate, the master prefect of Rax, a munitorum man to his core, ordered the garrison to put down the uprising that was now becoming almost total, but found his orders countermanded by word from the Cardinal's office. This was a religious affair, they said. The War of Faith had begun at last. The master prefect had failed in his duty to keep the heretic from the shores of Rax, and now the world's defense must lie with the faithful. Attempts by the prioresse of the Sororitas to intercede on behalf of law and order only resulted in her being clapped in irons and thrown into the dungeon with the rest of her mission similarly seized, although some sold their lives dearly in the process. With nothing in their way, the Zafanites, under Deacon Mammon's explicit direction, stormed the offices of the munitorum, killing the helpless master prefect as he fled to his personal shuttle. The astropaths, frantically screaming distress calls into the aether, were put to the bayonet. Outside in the labour camps and hab blocks, chaos reigned, but the citadel of Rax had fallen for the first time in its millennia long history, and had fallen from within. Cardinal Zafan, recovered from the attempt on his life, was now the sole unchallenged ruler of Rax, what would come next would be simply years of punishing, unrelenting, and apocalyptic slaughter, the likes of which are remarkable, even by the Imperium standards. That account must, however, wait for another day. Until such time, Ave Imperator, Gloria, in Excelsis, Terra. And as ever, thank you very much for watching.