Strela

Pict-file of Strela, Legion home world of the Warbringers Legion.

Novadeka Strelja

Imperium of Man (Formerly)

**Strela** is a civilised world that is also the Legion home world of the Warbringers Legion. Located in the Jagellonic System in the Segmentum Obscurus, this planet is also the sector capital of the Suzerainty.

## History

During the Dark Age of Technology, Strela was an industrial world, famed for its production of vehicles of all sorts. However with the advent of the Age of Strife it was engulfed in warp-storms, cut from its client-worlds, leading to great famines. War erupted for the control of the planet's rare fertile lands, and the great factories were destroyed to make way for the growth of cultures, their machinery salvaged as weapons. It was on that world, drowned in ceaseless war, that a comet struck the sky, bearing within it what would become the First Primarch, Kozja Darzalas.

The infantry Primarch's pod crashed on the ruins of a battlefield, as the victors were tending to their wounded and burying their dead. The strange contraption was far too advanced to be of Strelian design, and too ominous to have been a mere weapon. Scavengers rushed toward it, eager to steal whatever riches it might have contained. Inside they found only a child, whom they left in a shell-crater, instead choosing to recycle the pod's plating as armour. The infant primarch crawled through the hell-scape, only to cross the path of medical officers desperately trying to save a maimed soldier. These were more considerate, and took the child as a fellow tribe-member. He was given the name Kozja, a hero of ancient legends said to have emerged from among the dead.

Early on, Kozja displayed great curiosity towards life, owing to his kinship with the "corpse-walkers", these brave few who ventured on the battlefields in desperate search of survivors. His posthuman intellect granted him an almost instinctive understanding of human biology, and after a few years he grew to be the greatest surgeon of the Darzalan host. But still war raged upon Strela, and the primarch put his skills at use, at first devising drugs to increase the combat effectiveness of his troops. The first battle involving these augmented warriors was a triumph, and Kozja saw an opportunity to test his scientific prowess. From then on, he would strive to make his soldiers stronger, hardier, superior to their foes in every way. This way, he thought, his nation could conquer the whole planet, and Strela would at last know peace. But he also sought to emulate his own, inhuman design, for he had quickly discovered his nature as a post-human, an experiment lost in the wastes. Attempt to reverse-engineer his body led to no concrete results, but he learnt a great deal on genetics. These, rather than combat drugs, were the way forward.

In ten years the Darzalans grew to prominence, their Genetnik Huszars overwhelming all foes, unifying the main continents, famine being eradicated by the creation of hardier crops. Soon there was but one foe remaining: Zalmoxis, a kingdom entrenched in a mountainous massif, protected by a sprawl of fortresses, and whose soldiers wore powered plate armour, not dissimilar to those used on Terra during Old Night. The people of Darzalas had elected for Kozja to lead the offensive from the forefront, as their general and creator. Genetnik flesh clashed with rebel steel. Augmented muscles struggled against hydraulic pistons. Combat drugs and nerve-staples denied both sides the feeling of pain, as bullets and axes sundered armor plates. Kozja himself ensured that each citadel taken would hoist his heraldry of two crossed swords. While both forces were roughly equal at an individual level, the cossacks had the advantage of numbers, while their foes were working with a limited and dwindling arsenal of power-suits, without which they were doomed in close quarters. So it is that by the time Kozja came to depose the opposing king, his guard were the only ones left with the fabled armours, the rest fighting with whatever rifle they could scavenge.

When Kozja returned to his homeland, it was as a hero. The celebrations for his victory in the last campaign culminated in his crowning as King of the Strelians, the alabaster and gold of the planet's past glories restored upon him. Delegations from every nation came to bow before him. The last of these delegations went unannounced, giants in armours even greater than those of the Zalmoxites. The three foremost were a figure of authority in white and black, a mighty polearm in his hands; a smaller leader in purple armour, bearing a mighty shield; but the most intriguing was the gold-clad man. Kozja felt him as many things, a ruler, a warrior, a wizard, but here he saw him as a creator and gene-wright. As if hearing all the questions in his head, the giant extended his hand and declared: "Kozja Darzalas, subject Nine of Twenty, I am the Emperor of Mankind. I created you and your brothers to lead Humanity to reunite the Galaxy, as you created your host to unite this world. From your blood did I make these warriors, the ninth Legiones Astartes. Do you accept your duty, and take command of your sons and legion?"

The answer was immediate: "If such is my birthright, then let it be my duty to lead them across the Stars. For Mankind, and for your Empire."

Following the Ist Legion's reunification with their long lost Primarch, Strela became the Warbringers’ homeworld and took on the greatest importance for the Legion early on. However, the whole Jagellonic System was also part of their dominion. The system's other large inhabited planet was Vostala, an industrial world that had sold the Strelans materiel for their ongoing wars. This commerce was made possible by the Zalmoxite Platers, the people of an orbital plate that had maintained intra-system voyage technology.