Cult of the Sacred Suffering

**The Cult of Sacred Suffering** is a Pleasure Cult which emerged in the Dark Imperium. Founded as the Congregation of The Sacred Suffering by a corrupted Cardinal called Ajaxis, it operated as a sanctioned sect of the Imperial Creed preaching communion with the God-Emperor through pain and that suffering was a necessary part of repentance. Thanks to the Cardinal's influence, it soon spread throughout his diocese and beyond in the 42nd Millennium. At the height of its power, the Sacred Suffering engaged in a coordinated ritual of extreme self-flagellation across multiple planets. The collective suffering of millions of worshippers across the sector caused turmoil in the Warp and plunged three systems into total anarchy. This allowed daemonic incursions to manifest and, on the Cardinal World of Temperance, the depraved Noise Marines of The Enraptured warband landed to take advantage of the turmoil.

The Enraptured would take tens of thousands of mortal worshippers as willing slaves back to Castratus. There they would be segregated into new tribes to live on the surface, or distilled into the combat elixirs worshippers of Slaanesh are infamous for making. This, along with Cardinal Ajaxis dispatching dozens of transports filled with Sufferers out of the system, would save the cult from total destruction when the Ecclesiarchy launched a War of Faith known as The Cleansing of Temperance.

## Background

In the 42nd Millennium, especially in the Dark Imperium, many faithful Imperial worlds have been driven to new heights of religious fanaticism as the horrors of the Warp made themselves felt across half the galaxy. One such planet is the Cardinal World of Temperance in the north-east Ultima Segmentum. This planet was the religious lynchpin for a number of systems under the protection of the Order of Our Martyred Lady. The horrors of the Cicatrix Maledictum and the Noctis Aeterna drove more and more people into the arms of the Imperial Church, and their fear drove them to more violent extremes in expressing their faith.
One such man was Cardinal Ajaxis who found himself having recurring dreams of the God-Emperor. In his dreams, he saw the Emperor as if he had just been interred on the Golden Throne. As the Cardinal watched he would hear an authoritative yet benevolent voice whisper **know me**, as the Emperor's skin and muscles were flensed away by an unseen hand until he was nothing but a seated skeleton.

Ajaxis took this is as providence: a sign from the God-Emperor Himself to strengthen his flock's faith! And so he instituted the Congregation of The Sacred Suffering. This new movement was fastidiously studied and scrutinised by higher-ranking members of the Ecclesiarchy who could find nothing wrong with it. They reached this conclusion in part due to the influence of Cardinal Ajaxis, who used his charisma to subtly manipulate proceedings. On the surface, the Sufferers did not seem too different from the Ecclesiarchy-sanctioned Mortifex sect which preached similar tenets of communion-through-pain and produced many firebrand preachers who served in the Imperial Guard.

When the Congregation revealed their true colours as a Chaos Cult, it became apparent that 'The Flayed Emperor' was really a daemon of Slaanesh, who had been whispering honeyed lies into Cardinal Ajaxis' mind, feeding his sense of self-importance and inflaming his pride by helping him believe he was meant for something greater. Even with the truth revealed to them, most Sufferers were too corrupted to care, though some of the newer initiates who had not fallen nearly as far realised they had been tricked and turned their weapons on their brethren.

## Teachings

The Sacred Suffering initially taught that the best way to come closer to the God-Emperor (whom they view as 'The Flayed Emperor') in this life was to suffer pain, the more the better. It taught that the pain one suffered purified the soul and was the best form of repentance for one's sins. Over time, this view slowly and imperceptibly changed to the extent that pain became viewed as desirable in and of itself. As the sufferer focused his thoughts on the Emperor, he began to feel satisfaction at first, which would imperceptibly grow into pleasure as time passed. The believer did not question this, attributing it to religious ecstasy and the veracity of Cardinal Ajaxis' teachings.

The cultists were taught that piety would see the faithful brought into the Flayed Emperor's embrace in the afterlife, to exist in a state of pure bliss with His handmaidens forever more, and the physical world would be visited by His angels.

While this was true, it would not ultimately occur in ways they or their contemporaries would expect.

### Religious Practices

The congregation's members' daily prayer consisted of kneeling before a seated image of The Flayed Emperor and scourging themselves. which evolved over time into a desire to inflict it upon others. The Sacred Suffering's adherents also wore clothing with hooks or sharp points on the inward surfaces to ensure that every moment was spent in suffering.

Worshippers also chanted the Flayed Emperor's six-part mantra six times while they ritually injured themselves:

1) Devotion; Through Devotion, 2) Pain; through Pain, 3) Repentance; through Repentance, 4) Purity; through Purity, 5) Communion; through Communion, 6) Bliss

The Sufferers found this mantra heightened their spiritual awareness and further enhanced their ecstatic experience.

Sufferers also recited hymns, poems and liturgies from small chapbooks given to them upon initiation. These chapbooks were written by devoted scribes, often in books papered by the skins of their fellows, whose contents were handed down by Cardinal Ajaxis personally. He received them through further dreams of The Flayed Emperor and his angels. The more fanatical members of the cult eventually started carving or tattooing favourite verses or phrases onto their skin. Congregations would recite from these both during solo and group worship.

Upon closer examination of these texts by the Ordo Hereticus following the cult's seeming destruction, they were found to be heavily based on the *Chemosian Cantos*, a Chaos scripture penned in devotion to the Dark Prince Slaanesh.

## Interactions with Outsiders

At first, the Congregation's primary interaction with outsiders was via proselytism. The Sufferers, as they came to be called, wanted to convince as many as possible to join them willingly. They felt assured that their beliefs would be shown as true by a neophyte's own acts of worship. At first their missionary work involved willing converts, for they believed that nobody could be forced to repent of their sins at heart.

Over time, the Sufferers became more and more insular, as would be expected of a Pleasure Cult. Their missionary work dwindled as they started to view non-members as ignorant. After a certain point, the Cult began to rely entirely on new members recruited by their charismatic Cardinal. They became convinced of the self-evident truth of their beliefs, such that anyone who did not willingly join was merely an ignorant boor not deserving of bliss anyway. Thus, the cultists fell victim to pride. Over time, they began to believe that since pain was a purifying scalpel to the soul, the unbelievers deserved to be purified with agony.

Shortly before the final ritual which would plunge Temperance into anarchy, the Cardinal secretly permitted several transports crewed and stocked with loyal cult members to depart for deep space, hoping to spread his flock further afield. It is unknown if any of these ships have managed to reach any other worlds.