Askellon Sector - Vaxi Atrocity: Though it looms large in the ebb and low of cause and effect that has shaped -- and continues to shape -- the Askellon Sector, very few are aware of the truth of the Vaxi Atrocity, either within or without the region. Despite its portentous title, the Atrocity was committed not by any lord, or servant of a lord, of Askellon, but by the members of the Inquisition's Ordo Hereticus.The Vaxi Atrocity had as its roots an attempt by a number of Inquisitors, aligned to the veteran Witch Hunter Inquisitor Lord Spiron Hark, to investigate, and if needs be, purge, the Askellian nobility to get at the hidden secrets of the sector. Many had studied the remains of Dyrulli's researches, and even used his name and death as a rallying cry. Lord Hark was a notorious bombast and a Puritan through and through, and as such had garnered more than his fair share of rivals and enemies within the ranks of the Inquisition over the many solar decades of his service. These opposed his plans, apparently simply to frustrate Hark's rise in power and influence rather than because they objected to the course of action itself.Lord Hark called a conclave at Gnshal Oblitia, a world on the very edge of the sector. Towering in his black and gold power armour and crimson cloak, and reciting baleful stanzas from his Book of Ashes, he demanded action. A bitter exchange erupted in the hallowed vaults of the Oblitia Cathedra, soon followed by recriminations and accusations so severe they could not be withdrawn without substantial loss of face.Centuries of accumulated ill-will, anger, and virulent mistrust amongst the Inquisitors operating in the Askellon Sector seemed to quickly boil over to impossible levels. Hark finally gathered his household and his allied peers to leave the conclave for the inner Askellian worlds. Gesturing emphatically with his signature two-handed Power Sword, he declared to the assembled Inquisitors that he would have the truth, one way or the other, and with or without the blessings of those opposed to his direction.Inquisitor Hark's opponents, despite appearances, were not opposed to him merely because he was a Puritan and they were considered the opposite, however. Rather, it was because two solar decades before, they had instigated their own infiltration of the sector for their own ends, and feared Hark's interference would ruin their work. Exactly what that work amounted to or was aimed towards appears to be a secret these Radicals took to their graves, for ever is it said that history is written by the victorious.In this matter, Hark and his allies were the seeming victors, but only after a war and a calamity so pernicious it was dubbed the "Vaxi Atrocity" by those allowed to know of its true existence. Upon the disbandment of the assembly at Gnshal Oblitia, both factions set out for the sector's core, sweeping up what allies they could along the way and utilising their powers as Inquisitors to requisition what assets they encountered. Squadrons of battleships indentured from the Imperial Navy clashed in the void, for the will and power of the Inquisitors overrode all other Imperial agencies and commanders. As the rival groups penetrated deeper into the Rubicon Sub-sector, they called upon ever-greater forces, and entire regiments of the Astra Militarum mustered at their order from a swathe of worlds along a route many parsecs in length. By the time they crashed headlong into Rubicon, all pretence at due process was shed.The warring forces made planetfall on a number of systems across the sub-sector, unleashing the full potency of the armies they had requisitioned upon not just one another, but any others caught in the middle. Entire worlds were burning before the Lords of Askellon had any notion what was occurring. Sector-wide defence protocols were set in motion, but while the defenders had experience fighting uprisings, prosecuting mutant culls, and even stalling xenos invasions, none had ever faced an enemy as powerful as this in many centuries.Within solar weeks, all but a handful of inhabited star systems in the Rubicon Sub-sector were consumed in war, and those Astra Militarum regiments raised from Askellon's main worlds were in disarray. The Terminus Prime system defence fleet was reduced to a cloud of burning hulks, its squadrons paid for by the great Askellian merchant houses and entirely unsuited to the total war that descended without warning. At length, the sector praefect, at that time Lord Vhinjet Romonav VII, declared war upon the unknown invaders. Using the full extent of his own powers, he mustered as many regiments as could be raised on the world of Vaxi along the rimward border of Rubicon, determined to bring them to battle and stall the invasion of his realm.Lord Romonav's declaration was a strident statement, which began as a warning, but soon meandered into what amounted to an admission of heresy. Entire generations of scholars have debated whether Romonav intended to broadcast the message he did, or if he was overcome by hubris, misunderstood, caught in the grips of insanity, or even possessed by some Daemonic entity. Regardless of the truth, by the end of the message, which was transmitted using every astropathic choir on Juno and spread across Askellian space, the praefect had, with deliberate intent or otherwise, announced his sector's secession from the Imperium of Man.Confronted with treachery on such a massive scale and mindful of those shreds of the sector's history they had access to, the opposing Inquisitorial factions ceased their internecine battle. Immediately, they fell upon Vaxi and the millions of Askellian troops mustered there with power and potency surely not seen since the Macharian Crusade. The combined forces massacred the defenders in an Imperial Crusade so bloody none were spared. Every single warrior on Vaxi was punished for the crimes of Lord Romonav VII, either slain in battle or burned in massed pyres as tall as Warlord-class Titans .As the fires settled over Vaxi, Inquisitor Lord Hark called for a parley. Within the solar hour, a dozen of the most powerful and influential Inquisitors in the segmentum were facing one another across a plain of ash and scattered bone, the horizon alight in all directions with flames. The words that passed between them were either unrecorded, or else deliberately struck from any record, but their essence can be determined easily enough. The events leading up to the Vaxi Atrocity must not be repeated again, they agreed. Whatever gains were to be made from Inquisitors operating in the sector in their current manner could not possibly be worth visiting such destruction upon it that the bulk of an entire sub-sector lay in ruins, and Askellon stripped of its ability to defend itself should invasion come from an unexpected quarter.So far as Lord Romonav's treachery went, however, that could not be forgotten or forgiven. Shortly after his ill-judged declaration of secession, Romonav was found dead upon his throne at the annual state opening of court at the Pellucid Tower. Five thousand petitioners looked upon his face and blanched at the expression they saw on what remained of his features, before hurrying silently away lest such an awful fate be visited upon them too.There remain many who secretly believe that the events as related represent but the tip of an unfathomably-deep iceberg, and that some or all of the main figures involved were being horribly manipulated. Some whisper that Hark was but a puppet for some other secretive personages operating in the sector, others that Romonav's part was entirely staged, or did not originate from him at all. Even Dyrulli's name was brought into the affair, either to sully it further or show his works were truthful.To what ends the Vaxi Atrocity served these agencies is still speculated, for none dare speak openly given the power that was wielded. While an uneasy peace keeps the various factions from outright war, if one were to become too powerful in relation to the others, open war might again erupt between them. Those at the fringes of the numerous factions and philosophies in which the Inquisition is steeped appear ever ready to challenge this status quo, and none can predict when all-out internecine wars might come again. Few, however, doubt that they must, and worry who might be behind these new conflicts when they erupt, and for what benefit.