Bloodbath on Callatis

Two days after the departure of Strategos Kassandros from Korengal towards Hestea, the massive Iron Warrior force was identified advancing towards the Phrygian Sub-Sector. Then, word came to Warder Alketes of the plight of the Host of Aiakides: after the Cicatrix Maledictum, their entire Chapter had become becalmed in the warp for months, suffering from Gellar Field failures and Chaos daemon invasions. When they managed to leave the warp, their ships were all heavily damaged, with no warp travel capabilities and they found themselves in the Callatis system, a world long abandoned by mankind, its settlements and ruins having been mostly conquered once again by nature.

This was the dream that Agema Oracleos Pythios had, of the incoming doom of the Aiakidoi. Thus, Warder Alketes ordered an expedition fleet of two companies under Strategos Thorax to find and rescue the Host of Aiakides at all costs, now leaving Korengal with just four Phrygian Knights companies. Crucial to this decision was the fact that Warder Alketes thought that reinforcements were absolutely necessary for his prospects on the upcoming battle for Korengal. The destruction of the Aiakidoi would be a major setback for the Imperium and also spell doom for the Phrygian Knights themselves, this was certain. Nevertheless, due to the Cicatrix Maledictum no other imperial force was at hand.

After a year, Strategos Thorax finally arrived in Callatis, and a siege was taking place in its surface. A great World Eater warband and fleet had taken void superiority and was besieging the Host of Aiakides in the ruins of Callatis. Later, it became known that the Aiakidoi Warlord (Chapter Master) Brennus had ordered the evacuation from their unoperational vessels towards the ruins in the planet, as he saw the World Eaters arrive in the edge of the system. Most of the World Eaters and their thralls followed and besieged the Aiakidoi on Callatis, leaving their own vessels lightly guarded. Hence, though Strategos Thorax fleet was heavily outnumbered, he advanced with haste and the Phrygian Knights boarded the enemy vessels, capturing them one by one. The table had turned, and now the World Eaters on Callatis suffered a great orbital bombardment. Later, one of the two companies of the Phrygian Knights made a drop-pod assault on the ruins, and with the Host of Aiakides attacking from one side and the Phrygian Knights from the other, the World Eaters situation was grim, though they still outnumbered the loyalists. At the climax of the battle, an all-out melee started in the ruins of Callatis, the Aiakidoi sallying forth from their positions.

For hours the battle lasted, a massive bloodbath taking place in close-quarters with the thousands of humans that had followed the World Eaters dying. The World Eaters were not dealt with easily, however. Though they were surrounded, they took a heavy toll on the Phrygian Knights and the Aiakidoi. By the end, of the original ~900 Aiakidoi that had taken their positions in the ruins, only three hundred were still standing, and of the two-hundred Phrygian Knights that had fought in the void battle and in the surface, one hundred survived. Of the World Eater force of around one thousand World Eaters and one hundred thousand humans, it was destroyed entirely, not one individual surviving the battle.

With the rescue of the Host of Aiakides, Strategos Thorax gave them the World Eater vessels captured mostly intact, and the two fleets returned as one towards Korengal, until they separated when they were in the Phrygian Sub-Sector itself. Thorax and Brennus deliberately arrived in the Korengal system from opposite directions during the Iron Warrior invasion, their coming turning the tide in the Battle for Korengal.