Maximus

An isolated and monastic forge, the Priests of Maximus overwhelmingly follow the ‘Truth of Creation’, a philosophy that holds that the greatest act of devotion to the Omnissiah is creation, emulating the Deus Mechanicus’s creation of a perfect universe is by themselves creating masterpieces, be they machines, art or any other object born of the effort of the devoted. This faith has led to an insular culture, each powerful priest and their power base rarely interacting, isolating themselves to one of the countless giant workshops dotting the world. This fact has led to a remarkably calm political sphere on the world, the hierarchy rarely challenged.

Maximus’s leader is Fabricator-General Charim III, a priest best known for the masterwork suit of terminator armour gifted to X, Primarch of the Y than any political achievements or superb statesmanship. In a way, this scenario is favoured by the true leaders of Maximus, the twelve clans. The twelve clans are the cornerstone of life on Maximus, a societal organization of which only the Fabricator General and his servants are truly free of. Everyone and everything sans the independent Fabricator General is part of their ranks, part of a highly regimented organization devoted to ensuring the proper distribution of supplies and resources to the workshops, and the peaceful state of their society. Each clan, though technically beholden to the Fabricator General is de facto independent, run by one of the powerful Fabricator Locum’s who dictate every aspect of their clan.

As the world of Maximus is isolated from most contact with the outside galaxy by its position far outside conventional Imperial borders, supplies to fuel their workshops must be gathered by the clans themselves. Given their position, and the endless variety of threats their isolation brings, the clans' expeditions are among the most militarized and heavily armed in the Imperium. Millions of warriors, all equipped and built to the standards the Truth requires scour nearby worlds, crushing what evils lie in their way, and taking all they can.

The Priests of Maximus are generally conservative, preferring stability and tradition to change. Their acceptance of new technology, no matter how proven or safe, is inevitably incremental and cautious, the Priests rigorously inspecting every minutiae of a new design to weed out every flaw. Despite their skepticism towards new ideas, the clans occasionally create a new design or concept, almost always an off-shoot of some innovation created during the process of artifice. Promising designs are put through even more intensive testing than foreign ones, and are invariably extremely reliable and well-designed, the result of decades of incremental improvements. These designs are rarely as innovative as that of more liberal forges, but have often found widespread use throughout the Imperium, common enough that even the isolated forge is known to the average tech-priest as a place of great works.

Few groups have bonds of kinship with the insular priests of the lonely forge, and those that do are typically forges with strong influences from the Truth of Creation, or worlds in rough  proximity to it.

## **Notable Characters**

* **Trasius Jaar:** The Cult of Unrusted Steel is an unusual group on Maximus, devoted to the perfection of their own bodies through augmetics and bioengineered flesh. They have no regard for the Truth or the ways of the clans, devoting themselves only to the pursuit of perfecting their own form. Of their number, few were greater than Trasius Jaar, a Goliath of a man even before undertaking the full body augmetics typical of the cult. Once a brutish thug in the menial colonies of Maximus, his appetite for extreme violence and obsession with personal strength earned the attention of Cult leaders, who inducted him in with promises of great power and wealth. Trasius has never cared for the intricacies of the Cult Mechanicus, nor for the affairs of anyone other than himself, devoted purely to his own vanity and strength. This lack of faith, and penchant for extreme violence led him into the arms of chaos swiftly, a corruption with which he infested his Cult. Jaar was once a true giant of a priest, standing nearly twelve feet tall, and weighing several tons, his form of metal and engineered flesh dwarfing even some Primarchs. This form, bulging with muscle and sharp metal is devoted entirely to the pursuit of violence, with horrific artificial strength capable of tearing even armoured vehicles in Twain and a speed unbecoming of such a massive being. This strength allowed him much authority amongst the ranks of his cult, which slowly began to respect strength and violence over more peaceful qualities amongst its ranks. He broke every competitor in his rise to the top of the cult, and many others who happened to be in the way, thousands of his compatriots slain by his own hand. From his position at the head of the cult, Jaar led the cult directly into the worship of the Blood God, who blessed Trasius Jaar with even greater strength and power, and promised immortality should he deliver the world of Maximus to him. Jaar led a revolt during the darkest days of the fourth ruin, slaughtering millions in an attempted coup, slaying the Fabricator-Locum of his own clan and many hierarchs in a single bloody day. His revolt was ultimately a failure, the other clans massacred the cult and its supporters, defeating them swiftly on the field of battle, but Jaar, through the intervention of his patron escaped with his most loyal followers. They would prowl the stars for decades after, growing in number and strength, until they were eventually hunted down and exterminated by a large army from Maximus on the mining world of Jurim II. Jaar would not be saved by Khorne again however, his artificial body torn apart by a hunter-killer pack of Sicarans. As punishment for his horrific deeds his mind was locked in a neural-tomb, trapped in an eternal cycle of torture, with a personalized and adaptive digital landscape devoted to causing as much suffering as possible. Jaar’s mind remains in the vaults of Maximus to this day, continuing its eternal torment. At his peak Jaar was capable of incredible destruction, easily tearing automata apart, let alone those mortals who dared to oppose him. This strength and skill in combat was only matched by his ruthless cunning, a keen intellect that would take him nearly to the cusp of Daemonhood. His failed attempt to conquer Maximus left him scarred, his artificial flesh reeling from a devastating wound that would never fully heal, no matter how much of his body  was replaced. Despite this weakness, he remained incredibly powerful, easily dispatching any threat to his iron reign, before his ultimate downfall at the hands of a swarm of custom built assassins. His body was dominated by two horrifically oversized arms, constructed of adamantium and cloned Draal flesh, capable of outputting several hundred times the power of a normal human while also being far more flexible and durable. These arms were the centrepiece of his form, though powerful legs proved capable of launching him with similar relative force to an Astartes Jump Pack, and a variety of vicious mechadendrites erupted from his ribs and back, built to tear apart flesh and metal rather than any utilitarian purpose. His mind was self modified to perfectly incorporate this form, grotesquely proportioned limbs moving in perfect unison. In this process, Jaar removed any ability to feel sympathy or regret, tearing apart his own psyche in favour of physical perfection.