Iron Warriors - Notable Campaigns: The galaxy has felt the remorseless wrath of the Iron Warriors on numerous occasions. The death toll taken by Legions such as the World Eaters or the Black Legion is likely higher, for the Iron Warriors believe in attacks long-planned and painstakingly executed, but when they strike, they do so with such calculated and unremitting savagery that nothing can survive.Terran Unification Wars (Unknown Date.M30) - The IVth Legion took part in the destruction of the final resisting elements there and then throughout the pacification of Terra's solar system. Testament to this fact can be found in surviving frescos in the Imperial Palace, according them with the battle honours of the Cydo-Tyre Orbital, the Zidec Archipelago, Ice Station Echo and Mehr Yasht. The lattermost of these names, Mehr Yasht, is perhaps the most noteworthy as it was the key battle of the punishing Venusian campaign and its citation accords "...the serried ranks and proud steel banners of the IVth Legion..." as going forth into battle under the direct command of the Emperor Himself to break the back of the deadly Litho-Gholem armies of the War Witches.Compliance of Incaladion (842-843.M30) - The IVth Legion's 8th Expeditionary Fleet's pronounced reliance on rationality and intellect set against their bloody-minded stubbornness came to the fore during the Imperial Compliance campaign of the Forge World of Incaladion in a gruelling year-long action. Although victory was eventually achieved, the operation would see the near-annihilation of the 8th Expeditionary Fleet's frontline forces in what was arguably a needlessly costly fashion. During this battle, the Legion refused to withdraw from the field after an initial assault unravelled spectacularly in the face of unprecedented and unexpected enemy counterattack; they fought on regardless, adhering to a battle plan already in tatters. Nearly 29,000 of their number fell in the single engagement before enemy forces were worn down by bloody attrition, including many of the Legion's most veteran units, making the battle one of the most costly of its age.The Fall of the Black Judges (Late 840s.M30) - This was the Iron Warriors' first Imperial Compliance campaign under the direct command of their Primarch, which was conducted against the barren, ravine-hollowed moon known as the "Rock of Judgement" and its masters, the heretical Black Judges. These self-appointed arbiters of human purity, life and death, were twisted and withered creatures that had once been human in ages past. They had extended their lifespans into millennia with the help of technology as ancient as it was dark. Encased within mechanised war machines controlled by cybernetic implants, in order to live they required regular infusions of fresh human genetic material extracted through a painful, fatal arcane process. From the Rock of Judgement they held sway over a dozen nearby human-inhabited worlds through terror, offering a devil's bargain of protection from xenos assault in return for a tribute of the young and healthy. The IVth Legion, reeling from its enforced Decimation as punishment at its new master's hands, was shamed into a desperate desire to prove itself to its Primarch, and it was the Black Judges that were to suffer its pent-up hatred and wrath. By Perturabo's design the enemy was crushed without mercy and their domains were stripped of every valuable resource and technology; wreckage and weapons flowed to Olympia and the Black Judges' long guarded secrets fell also to the newly renamed Iron Warriors and their master, as well as to the Mechanicum in return for their aid. With the world stripped of its resources, the orbital shipyards of the Rock of Judgement were finally set in orbit afresh around Olympia and set to work fashioning a new generation of warships under Perturabo's seal. The newly-inducted Astartes recruits from the Iron Warriors' homeworld of Olympia acquitted themselves well and their triumphant return was celebrated in the famous Palimodes Fresco, now known only through fragmented holo-recordings.Pacification of Schravaan (850s.M30) - This was a joint Imperial Compliance campaign conducted by the Iron Warriors, Imperial Fists, Emperor's Children and the Luna Wolves Legions against the xenos Badoon on the world of Schravaan. The Iron Warriors won a great victory when they stormed the final refuge of the Badoon. They breached the defences and held while the other Legions carried the city beyond. During the following victory feast, Horus proclaimed Perturabo the greatest master of siege warfare in the Great Crusade. Fulgrim, the Primarch of the Emperor's Children Legion, then inquired to his brother Dorn whether he thought even the defences of the Imperial Palace could resist the Iron Warriors, in which Dorn replied that he regarded the defences as being proof against any assault if well-planned. Perturabo flew into a rage and unleashed unfounded accusations against his brother. After this the two rarely spoke, and their Legions did not serve in the same campaign for the remainder of the Crusade.WAAAGH! Mashogg (Mid-800s.M30) - In one famous instance, a joint Imperial Compliance campaign was conducted by the Iron Warriors, Space Wolves and White Scars Legions against the Greenskins. Legends record that it was the Primarchs Leman Russ and Jaghatai Khan who routed the Orks of Overdog Mashogg's WAAAGH!, while Perturabo was featured only as the "comrade" who calculated the optimum way to bypass Mashogg's low orbit defences.Compliance of the Araaki Spiral (Mid 800s.M30) - A joint Imperial Compliance campaign was conducted by the Iron Warriors, Imperial Fists, Dark Angels and White Scars Legions in a region of space known as the Araaki Spiral. The Araakites were well-versed in the art of building fortresses, and their strongholds were dug deep around narrow passes, remote hilltops and natural barriers in the landscape. Once again, the Iron Warriors were sent to a resistant star system to conduct brutal siege-warfare against formidable fortress-builders. The Araakites knew their craft well and the campaign to take their world for the Imperium proved both bitter and hostile. It would take many years for the IVth Legion to regain its former strength from the losses sustained during the drawn-out war of attrition that its Astartes suffered in the Araaki Spiral. In the wake of the inevitable Imperial victory, great works of art and heroic verse were composed, celebrating the courage of the other Space Marine Legions, but nowhere in the reams of poetry and artwork were the grim labours of the Iron Warriors judged worthy of note. Only in a predella to a larger work painted by a notable Imperial artisan were the warriors of the IVth Legion displayed; it illustrated a lone Iron Warriors Apothecary removing the gene-seed of a dying Legionary as the flag of the IVth Legion's greatest rivals, the Imperial Fists, flew over a captured fortress. Perturabo sought out the artist to procure the piece for himself, only to have it put it to the torch once he had done so. If his sons would not be honoured properly, he told the horrified artist, then they would not be a part of a record that glorified another. Afterwards, Rogal Dorn had offered a rich commission for the artist to repaint the predella, but the artisan wisely refused.Nove Shendak Campaign (World Eight-Two-Seventeen) (Mid-800s.M30) - Nove Shendak was a world of worms; giant creatures, intelligent. Hateful. Their weapons were filaments, metal feathers that they embedded in themselves to conduct energies out of their bodies. The surface would roil with the filaments before the worms broke out of it almost at the Imperial defenders' feet. Thick as a man, longer that a person was tall. They had three mouths in their faces, a dozen teeth in their mouths. They spoke through the mud in sonic screams and witch-whispers. Early in the Great Crusade, the War Hounds Legion, still without their primarch, had found three star systems under their thrall, burned them out of their colony nests and chased them home. But on their cradle-world the XIIth Legion had found humans. Humans lost to humanity for who knows how long, crawling on the land while the worms slithered in the marsh seas. Hunting the humans, farming them. Killing them. The War Hounds, alongside their fellow Astartes Legion the Iron Warriors, and a large contingent of Imperial Army soldier were charged with exterminating the worms and liberating the humans of this world. Fighting the worms was next to impossible as the lunar tides dragged the mud oceans to and fro across the jagged stone continents, making the ground very unstable. The Imperial forces had to use sentries with high-powered lasguns to read the movements of the mud to hear the worms moving through it towards them. Explosives were seeded around the earthworks and allowed to sink to where the worms burrowed. Perturabo had the Iron Warriors build earthworks. They built trenches and dykes, penned in the mud seas and drained them, drove the worms back, reclaimed land the wretched humans could build on. And when the worms came out to fight the Imperials, they met the Emperor and His War Hounds. Though the casualties were horrendous, the War Hounds eventually emerged triumphant.Vulpa Straits Hrud Migration (004.M31) - Commanding the 51st Expeditionary Fleet, the Warsmith Barabas Dantioch led a large Iron Warriors contingent against a massive xenos incursion known as the Vulpa Straits Hrud Migration. Upon the Fortress World of Gholgis the Hrud infiltrated and destroyed the Iron Warriors garrison. The intense entropic fields generated by the migratory Hrud swarms caused stone to age and brought flesh to ruin, turning the Astartes warriors into so much dust and bones, rusting their armour and jamming their Bolters as the Iron Warriors' fortress crumbled all about them. Only then did the rachidian beasts creep out of every nook and crevice to attack, stabbing and slicing with their venomous claws. This left Warsmith Dantioch prematurely aged and crippled. Very few survivors made it out alive as Stormbirds extracted the survivors from the remains of Gholgis. Many of the Astartes died from premature aging or were left in aged, superhuman bodies. In the Hrud Migration's aftermath, the worlds of Krak Fiorina, Stratopolae and Gholghis were lost. The Warsmith questioned Primarch Perturabo's prosecution of the Hrud extermination campaign, which left half a Grand Company dead. Dantioch soon found himself relieved from command of the 51st Expeditionary Fleet and permanently garrisoned to the world of Lesser Damantyne for his presumption.Pacification of Gugann and the Olympia Genocide (004.M31) - The Iron Warriors conducted a campaign against the xenos known as the Hrud upon the world of Gugann. It was during this campaign that Warmaster Horus broke the news to Perturabo that Olympia was in rebellion. The appointed Imperial Planetary Governor Dammekos had died and the population, incited by demagogues, had taken up arms. The thought of being the only Legion unable to hold its own homeworld appalled and infuriated Perturabo. By this time, Horus was fully corrupted by Chaos, and he sought to make the most of this opportunity. He presented Perturabo with the hammer Forgebreaker as a mark of respect, signalling the pact between the two Primarchs. There is still much debate whether this weapon was some kind of conduit through which the Ruinous Powers could manipulate the Iron Warriors Primarch. The Iron Warriors would go on to brutally suppress the population on their homeworld, committing genocide against 5 million civilians. This would seal their fate as the Iron Warriors become fully corrupted by Chaos during this campaign and they were easily swayed to join Horus' cause.Drop Site Massacre of Istvaan V (566.006.M31) - Noted as one of the most devastating defeats in the history of the Adeptus Astartes, the Drop Site Massacre of Istvaan V saw the Raven Guard and Salamanders Legions nearly annihilated as effective fighting forces and only the quick thinking and initiative of the Salamanders allowed a bare few Space Marines of these two Legions to escape that dreadful day. In response to the treachery of the Warmaster Horus and his betrayal of the Loyalist Astartes in the Sons of Horus, Emperor's Children, World Eaters and Death Guard Legions at Istvaan III, the Primarch of the Imperial Fists Legion, Rogal Dorn, on the direction of the Emperor who had learned of Horus' actions from the Loyalist survivors aboard the Eisenstein, ordered 7 Loyalist Space Marine Legions to Horus' base on the world of Istvaan V to challenge the Traitors. They would attack in two waves and fall under the supreme command of the Iron Hands' Primarch Ferrus Manus. The Legions comprising the first wave were the Iron Hands, Raven Guard and Salamanders. The Legions comprising the second wave were the Iron Warriors, Alpha Legion, Night Lords, and a large contingent of Word Bearers that their Primarch Lorgar had stationed in the star system. Unknown to Dorn and Ferrus Manus, the Night Lords, Alpha Legion, Iron Warriors and Word Bearers had all turned from their service to the Emperor and secretly pledged their loyalty to Horus, and been instructed to keep their new allegiance to Chaos a secret. The Iron Hands, Salamanders and Raven Guard were deployed in the first wave of the assault. After they secured the drop site, they were to have been followed by the arrival of the other four Legions. The first wave secured the drop site, known as the Urgall Depression, though at a heavy cost. Horus ordered his front line troops to fall back in a feint, tempting Ferrus Manus to overstretch his already thin lines. Against the advice of Corax and Vulkan, Manus led his Veterans against the fleeing Traitor Marines unsupported. Manus then brought his brother Fulgrim to combat. As the two Primarchs drew their weapons, the Raven Guard and Salamanders fell back to regroup and allow the second wave's Legions to advance and earn glory. The secret Traitor Legions mustered in the landing zone, armed and ready for battle, unbloodied and fresh. The Iron Warriors had claimed the highest ground, taking the Loyalist landing site with all the appearance of reinforcing it through the erection of prefabricated plasteel bunkers. Bulk landers dropped the battlefield architecture: dense metal frames fell from the cargo claws of carrier ships at low altitude, and as the platforms crashed and embedded themselves in the ground, the craftsmen-warriors of the IVth Legion worked, affixed, bolted and constructed them into hastily-rising firebases. Turrets rose from their protective housing in the hundreds, while hordes of lobotomised Servitors trundled from the holds of Iron Warriors troopships, single-minded in their intent to link with the weapons systems' interfaces. The Word Bearers bolstered their brother Legions on one flank of the Urgall Depression while the Night Lords took positions on the opposite side. Down the line, past the mounting masses of Iron Warriors battle tanks and assembling Astartes, First Captain Sevatar of the Night Lords and his 1st Company elite, the Atramentar, took up defensive positions. Both the Word Bearers and the Night Lords were to be the anvil, while the Iron Warriors would be the hammer yet to fall. The enemy would stagger back to them, exhausted, clutching empty Bolters and broken blades, believing their presence to be a reprieve. Though the Salamanders and the Raven Guard voxed hails requesting medical aid and re-supply, the line of Astartes atop the northern ridge remained grimly silent as the exhausted warriors of the Raven Guard and Salamanders came to within a hundred metres of their allies. It was then that Horus revealed his perfidy and sprung his lethal trap. Inside the black fortress where Horus had made his lair, a lone flare shot skyward, exploding in a hellish red glow that lit the battlefield below. The fire of betrayal roared from the barrels of a thousand guns, as the second wave of Astartes revealed where their true loyalties now lay. At the same time, the apparent rout of the Sons of Horus, the World Eaters, Death Guard and Emperor's Children suddenly halted and the Traitors pressed their attack. As Horus pressed the counterattack he managed to sandwich the Loyalists between the two Traitor forces, killing most of them. Meanwhile, the Iron Hands were cut off and slaughtered to a man -- the Veteran Morlock Terminators cut down and the Primarch Ferrus Manus beheaded by Fulgrim. The Salamanders and Raven Guard could do nothing to help the Iron Hands, and were forced to make a costly break-out with precious few of their forces. Those Thunderhawk and Stormbird gunships that lifted off and escaped Istvaan V were far fewer than those that had landed. Corax, the Primarch of the Raven Guard, was badly wounded and Vulkan's fate was unknown for some time. The remainder of the Iron Hands' Legion arrived to find their Veterans and Primarch dead and the Salamanders and Raven Guard reduced to a fraction of their full strength, with both Legions nearly wiped out.Siege of Lesser Damantyne (006.M31) - Commanding the 51st Expeditionary Fleet, Warsmith Barabas Dantioch led a large Iron Warriors detachment in bringing the world of Lesser Damantyne into Imperial Compliance. The Warsmith would later be laid low during a massive Hrud infestation on the world of Gholghis which left him prematurely aged and crippled by the attack of those foul xenos. Warsmith Dantioch left the 51st Expedition to garrison the world of Lesser Damantyne, becoming the planner and architect of the superbly fortified Schadenhold fortress. During the many months the small Iron Warriors detachment had garrisoned the planet, they heard disturbing rumours of the galaxy being conquered by the Traitor forces of the Warmaster Horus. Dantioch suspected that the bulk of the IVth Legion had willingly joined the Warmaster's cause. When Warsmith Krendl arrived at Lesser Damantyn with the 51st Expeditionary Fleet, he came to the Schadenhold with new orders for the Iron Warriors garrison. They were ordered by their Primarch to prepare for the Traitors' offensive against Terra. Lesser Damantyne would be used as a resupply point for Horus' forces. Dantioch refused to acquiesce to his Primarch's orders for the Iron Warriors on Lesser Damantyne remained Loyalists and would not share in their traitorous brethren's damnation. Krendl vowed to destroy Dantioch's beloved fortress in the name of Horus. Dantioch commanded his meagre forces against the entire might of the 51st Expeditionary Fleet and the 14th Grand Company of the Iron Warriors for 366 standard days, until the Traitors deployed an Imperator-class Titan to destroy the Schadenhold. Just before the fortress fell, Dantioch and the surviving Loyalist Iron Warriors teleported aboard the Traitor's flagship and commandeered it. The Warsmith then set course towards Terra with the aim of helping to fortify and defend the Emperor's Imperial Palace against the forces of the Traitor Legions. Dantioch's ultimate fate remains unrecorded in Imperial records at this time.First Siege of Hydra Cordatus (007.M31) - Unknown to Captain Cassander, the Imperial Fists officer who had been left in command of the detachment of Space Marines that remained behind on Hydra Cordatus after the Imperial Fists' Expeditionary Fleet left, the Warmaster Horus had fallen to the corrupting influence of Chaos and had instigated a galaxy-wide rebellion in order to overthrow the Imperium of Man and raise himself up as the new Master of Mankind. Shortly after the disastrous events of the Drop Site Massacre of Istvaan V had played out to their tragic conclusion, the traitorous Iron Warriors Legion saw the opportunity to humble their hated rivals, the Imperial Fists, upon the isolated world of Hydra Cordatus which had only recently been brought into Imperial Compliance. When the order came from Rogal Dorn for all of the Imperial Fists to return to Terra to begin overseeing the defence of the Imperial Palace, Captain Cassander had begun preparations to depart immediately, but the sudden death of his vessel's Navigator had left the detachments of the Imperial Fists upon Hydra Cordatus stranded until a replacement could be dispatched. The following day, word of the Warmaster's treachery and the massacre on Istvaan V reached Hydra Cordatus. Pride in an honourable assignment was replaced by frustration and bitter disappointment that the Imperial Fists present on the world could not fight alongside their Battle-Brothers, and could not call Horus to account for his perfidy and punish those who had trampled their oaths of loyalty to the Emperor into the dust. But the chance to make war on the traitorous allies of Horus came soon enough. The Iron Warriors made planetfall in the wake of a saturation bombardment that reduced the valley where the Cadmean Citadel was situated and the agri-settlements filling its fertile deltas to ash. Magma bombs and mass drivers boiled away the rivers and reduced fecund earth to arid dust. The Cadmean Citadel was left untouched, and Cassander still found it difficult to believe that such a precise bombardment was possible. But the Iron Warriors had purposely done this in order to show the Imperial Fists that they were superior to them in every way. The technological cunning of the ancient fortress builders, married to the artfully wrought geography and the courage of the defenders, proceeded to keep the Iron Warriors at bay for almost three months. Every day Cassander's warriors stayed alive kept the enemy from redeploying and bringing their strength to bear elsewhere against the Loyalists. Yet, when the Iron Warriors finally overcame the citadel's ancient defences and broke open its walls they would run amok. They would slaughter the remaining Imperial Fists Legionaries, the heroic men and women of Hyrdra Cordatus that had chosen to stand with them, and the refugees from the devastated fields below the fortress. Fifty-two Imperial Fists and thirteen thousand men, women and children were crammed within the citadel's walls. When the final assault came, the Primarch Perturabo himself spearheaded an audacious attack upon the citadel's defenders, and slaughtered over thirty Imperial Fists Astartes himself in a span of only a few minutes. The rest of the Cadmean Citadel's defenders were slaughtered to a man and the surviving refugees were enslaved by the Iron Warriors before they moved on to their next objective. Hydra Cordatus was reduced to a barren desert world by the Traitor Legion's assault, and after the end of the Heresy was repopulated as an Adeptus Mechanicus research station and as a depository for the Imperial Fists Chapter's gene-seed.Battle of Phall (007.M31) - During the Horus Heresy, at the command of Horus, a large Iron Warriors contingent was sent to halt the encroaching Imperial Fists fleet that had originally been sent to Istvaan III to reinforce the beleaguered Loyalists. The Traitors could not allow such a strong complement of Astartes to infiltrate their controlled area of space, for they could seriously disrupt preparations for the Traitors' attack on Terra. Commanding over twenty large warships, Perturabo led his fleet in a sudden and devastating attack upon the Imperial Fists fleet in what became known as the Battle of Phall. Over a dozen vessels were ripped apart by the brutal hail of fire from the Traitor vessels. The Imperial Fists fought back, devastating the lead ships of the Iron Warriors' fleet, tearing them apart in a vicious firestorm. The Loyalists gained the initiative in the battle and managed to repel the Traitors' surprise attack, despite severe losses at the start of the engagement. Launching a counterattack, the Imperial Fists drove off the embattled Traitor fleet and managed to break orbit and manoeuvre to their jump points, to enter the Warp and make for Terra.Assault on Iydris (ca. 007.M31) - In the wake of the terrible slaughter of Loyalists at the Drop Site Massacre on Istvaan V, a small fleet of Astartes from the ravaged Iron Hands and Raven Guard Legions managed to flee off-world. Among these vessels was the Sisypheum, a Strike Cruiser commanded by the mortally wounded Iron Hands Captain Ulrach Branthan. Determined to continue to strike against the Traitor Legions wherever and whenever they could, the crew of the Sisypheum eventually managed to intercept the encoded communications of the Traitors and learned that the Traitor Primarchs Fulgrim and Perturabo were leading their Emperor's Children and Iron Warriors Traitor Legions, respectively, into the Warp Rift later named the Eye of Terror by Perturabo in search of an unknown Eldar weapon known as the Angel Exterminatus which could decisively tip the balance of the Horus Heresy in favour of the Traitors. The Iron Hands eventually assembled a small fleet of similar Loyalist survivors of the Drop Site Massacre and made their way into the Eye to stop the Traitors from acquiring this weapon. Once within the Eye, Fulgrim led the combined Traitor Legion forces to the ancient Eldar Crone World of Iydris, into the citadel known as Amon ny-shak Kaelis where the Angel Exterminatus was supposedly located. The Traitors were forced to repel countless attacks by the ancient Eldar defense systems and by attacks from Eldar constructs animated by the countless dead Eldar souls of the Crone World. In truth, the entire quest for the Angel Exterminatus had been a ruse perpetrated upon Perturabo and the Iron Warriors by Fulgrim and the Emperor's Children. Fulgrim, now a Champion of the Chaos God of Pleasure, Slaanesh, sought apotheosis to become a Daemon Prince of the Prince of Chaos. But he needed the power provided by the life force of a Primarch and the sacred energies of a place like an Eldar Crone World that was sacred to Slaanesh to complete his ascension to daemonhood. Fulgrim had given to Perturabo a cloak, to which was affixed a skull-shaped pin carrying a relic known as a maugetar stone. As long as Perturabo was within the confines of the Eldar citadel the stone slowly absorbed his life force and fed these energies to Fulgrim. Once Perturabo discovered his brother's perfidy, the Iron Warriors launched an assault upon the Emperor's Children, and a three-way battle soon developed as the Iron Hands from the Sisypheum and its small flotilla of Loyalists entered the fray against both Traitor forces, unaware of what was truly happening. In the course of the combat that followed, Perturabo slew Fulgrim's mortal body with the great warhammer Forgebreaker, which ironically had originally been forged for Fulgrim by Ferrus Manus. But this action was only the final component in Fulgrim's ritual of apotheosis, and his body remade itself into the twisted, serpentine form of a Slaaneshi Daemon Prince. Fulgrim became the first of the Traitor Primarchs to ascend to daemonhood, but he would not be the last. His goal achieved, Fulgrim had teleported his Emperor's Children away from Iydris and the Crone World began to collapse as the potent life forces of the dead that had long sustained it were drained away by Fulgrim's ascension. The Iron Hands and Perturabo's Iron Warriors successfully fled the crumbling planet, though Perturabo escaped by taking his fleet deeper into the black hole that lay at the centre of the Eye of Terror. For the first time, one of the Traitor Legions had turned on another, a situation that was to become all too common as the Dark Gods of Chaos tightened their grip on Horus' followers.The Vannaheim Space Drop (008-009.M31) - The Iron Warriors launch a daring void assault against the orbital hives of Vannaheim, capturing vital facilities after ten days of brutal fighting. A Loyalist force in the Segmentum Tempestus, including isolated elements of the Space Wolves Legion, is drawn into the conflict, launching three successive counter-assaults in order to recapture the orbital hive stations' vital altitudinal control grid, but each fails to achieve its goal and countless thousands of Loyalist lives are lost. The famed Space Wolves grand cruiser, Helicon Spear, is captured and becomes a prize of the Iron Warriors Legion during the last, disastrous attempt.Battle of Tallarn (010-011.M31) - Tallarn, an Imperial muster world of almost unparalleled size and importance, comes under direct attack by the Iron Warriors Legion. Here the Traitors unleash a virus bombardment that renders the surface of the verdant world of Tallarn to poisoned slime and the air unbreathable. The invasion that follows develops into the largest armoured battle of the Imperium's history, a war fought under the most hellish conditions imaginable. As the war grinds on, it draws in Loyalist and Traitor forces from hundreds of worlds across the entire Segmentum Tempestus before its cataclysmic conclusion.Battle of Terra (014.M31) - As the events of the Horus Heresy neared their tragic conclusion seven years after the fateful betrayal at Istvaan III, those Loyalist Legions not committed to the defence of Terra raced through the Warp, converging on the homeworld of Mankind. The Traitor Legions also massed above Terra to assault the Imperial Palace. The Battle of Terra was the final confrontation of the Horus Heresy that raged on Terra itself between the Forces of Chaos led by the Warmaster Horus and the Loyalist armies of the Imperium of Man led by the Emperor of Mankind himself. The Sons of Perturabo would at long last be able to test themselves against those of Rogal Dorn. The Loyalist forces ultimately proved victorious in their defence of the Imperial Palace, though only just barely, and Horus was ultimately slain by the full psychic powers unleashed by the Emperor on the deck of his massive Battle Barge the Vengeful Spirit, though the Master of Mankind was mortally wounded and had to be interred within the cybernetic life support mechanisms of the advanced psychic augmentation technology known as the Golden Throne. It cannot be known whether Dorn's masterfully constructed defences would have proved the undoing of the Iron Warriors, for the Warmaster was slain before the matter could be fully determined. The outcome of the Battle of Terra shaped the destiny of humanity for the next 10,000 standard years. The Traitor hosts began their fighting withdrawal, and in the anarchy and confusion Horus' body was recovered by his Legion from his flagship. Having fought their way clear of the Sol System the IVth Legion fled for the Eye of Terror where they eventually established the daemonic Fortress World of Medrengard. Those Iron Warriors that had established their own empire around Olympia prepared themselves for the inevitable assault by the Loyalist Legions. In a reversal of fortune typical of the grim epoch that ushered in the Age of the Imperium, the Imperial Fists were amongst those who laid siege to these Iron Warriors, and while the Traitors were eventually dislodged, it was only after a decade-long campaign that culminated in them detonating their nucleonic stockpiles and reducing Olympia to a blasted waste.Battle of the Iron Cage (ca. 014-021.M31) - Upon the world of Sebastus IV the traitorous Iron Warriors, bitter archenemies of the Imperial Fists, laid an ingenious trap to ensnare Rogal Dorn and his Legion. Heedless of the inherent danger, the Primarch ordered the Imperial Fists to attack the Iron Warriors' Eternal Fortress -- later referred to as the "Iron Cage" by the surviving Astartes of the VIIth Legion. The battle should have favoured the treacherous trench-fighters of the Iron Warriors, but the Imperial Fists endured. For all their skill and ferocity, as devotees of Chaos, the Iron Warriors lacked the faith required to make the ultimate sacrifice that victory -- and the Ruinous Powers -- demanded. While they paused, the UltramarinesLegion intervened; Roboute Guilliman had decided that Perturabo's destruction was not worth the loss of Rogal Dorn and had brought his Astartes to drive off the Iron Warriors.The Dispute of Iron (ca.600-730.M34) - Its cause hidden to the eyes of the Imperium, a vast civil war erupts on the Daemon World of Medrengard and rapidly spreads to the other domains of the Iron Warriors. Ancient pacts of fealty and alliance are called upon and scores of Chaos Space Marine warbands, daemons and Traitor Titan Legions are drawn into the maelstrom of relentless battle. This bitter feud is accredited at creating several sub-factions of Iron Warriors still active to the present day, such as the Steel Brethren, while utterly destroying others such as the Shattered Tower. As abruptly as it was begun the war suddenly ended, leading some to believe that the official conflict had been carried out according to the Daemon Primarch Perturabo's design in order to weed out the weak and the unworthy from his scions.A Rebellion Crushed (Unknown Date) - A mountainous edifice encrusted with gargoyle-mouthed cannons, the Imperial Hive World of Cornucopeon's capital hive of Steelstone Keep supplies tithes of war materiel to the Iron Warriors. When the industrialist Korothrodd Vessh doubles his tithes after a costly campaign, Steelstone Keep's defenders rise up against the iron-collared Chaos Cultists that keep them beneath the lash. The cult leader that oversees the hive's infernal industry is battered to death by smithy hammers, but not before he swears a mighty oath of vengeance with his last breath. Perturabo hears its echo in the Warp. Within a solar week, Cornucopeon is infested by locomotive-sized Daemon Engines that burrow through the planet like maggots gnawing through an apple. They rise up under Steelstone Keep itself, erupting in geysers of magma to disgorge Iron Warriors from their fleshmetal bellies. The rebellious defenders fight level by level as Perturabo's Kill-teams gut the hive from the inside out. Beneath them a rising tide of magma burns away all evidence of Steelstone's rebellion. When the Iron Warriors leave from the hive spires, the only evidence of the uprising is a metallic mountain filled with cooling igneous rock.The Humbling (Unknown Date) - Endt Thrinn, the genius Planetary Governor of Inviolus, completes his dynasty's planet-girdling fortress network. In his cups, he is much given to boast that his home planet is unassailable. Agents of the Alpha Legion relay this claim to their Iron Warriors brothers, and before long the Chaos Lord Mandrakk has made Warp translation in-system at the head of a large fleet. Instead of attacking Inviolus directly, he invades the nearby Agri-World of Dalathro's Rest. The bread basket of the Inviolus System, Dalathro's Rest is well defended by the Astra Militarum. Mandrakk bombards it from orbit whilst launching boarding actions against every voidcraft bound for Inviolus. Within the solar year the people of Inviolus are crippled by starvation. Though reinforcement arrives in the form of a company of Mentor Legion Space Marines, Mandrakk has ensured that Inviolus' half-starved defence forces are easy prey for his teleporting Annihilation Squads. The planet is seized and repurposed as a Chaos base.The Wars of Flesh (Unknown Date) - The transmogrifying daemonic plague known as the Technovirus spreads from Medrengard's deepest dungeons across the worlds of the Eye of Terror. It infects metal construct and mortal body alike, turning one to the other and blending warriors with their weapons and wargear until only sentient-metal machine-things remain. After the resultant conflicts, known as the Wars of Flesh, the nihilistic Cult of Destruction proliferates massively. Obliterators and Mutilators join the ranks of the Iron Warriors in ever greater numbers.The Machine Eyrie (Unknown Date.M41) - The Iron Warriors flagship Merciless Spite is forced to crash land in the salt-rich Glowing Ocean of the Feudal World of Prime Gala. Colonised by House Terryn several Terran years earlier, the planet's Imperial Knight defenders stride out into the shallow waters to attack the crashed voidship. The first wave, led by King Dontros, scales one flank of the Spite, only to find its upper reaches infested by Heldrakes. The Knights fight bravely, but the Daemon Engines attack in such numbers they are toppled into the sea or ripped apart. The second wave, attacking some solar weeks later, is confronted by the corrupted remnants of their former comrades -- the Merciless Spite’s master, Lord Admiral Vaen, has replaced each Throne Mechanicum's incumbent with one of his own Chosen lieutenants. Over the next three solar months, the terrifying combination of Renegade Knights and Heldrakes allows the Iron Warriors to enslave the Feudal World's population from one pole to the other.Scouring of Makenna VII (Unknown Date.M41) - This campaign was conducted by various factions of the Forces of Chaos under the command of the Chaos Lord Davroth of the Word Bearers Traitor Legion. The Forces of Chaos sought to conquer and enslave the Imperial Mining World of Makenna VII. An outcast from the Iron Warriors since his defeat at the Fortress of Ventemar on the Iron Warriors' Daemon World of Medrengard, Warsmith Baldarun sought the means to rebuild his standing, and to do so he sought to take part in the Chaos campaign on Makenna VII. He became the leader of a Renegade Space Marines warband known as Abrial's Claw after swearing an oath of brotherhood to its former Lord, Abrial Shard. In return, Baldarun relinquished the secrets of his beloved technovirus to Shard's men.Temporia Emerges from the Warp (Unknown Date.M41) - In a feat of engineering only the truly insane could devise, the Dark Mechanicum stronghold world of Temporia is dragged out of the Eye of Terror by an armada of gravitic tugs and daemon-possessed haulers. The mutant machines churned out by the planet's sprawling daemon-foundries assail the Cadian System by the thousand.Siege of Vraks (813-830.M41) - The Iron Warriors warband known as the Steel Brethren took part in the Siege of Vraks upon the Imperial world of Vraks Prime, in which the Forces of Chaos, led by the Heretic Cardinal-Astra Xaphan, sought to defend the planet from an assault by the Imperial 88th Siege Army. After 17 standard years of brutal attrition, Vraks Prime's entire original population of 8 million souls had been consumed in the violence or exterminated by the Imperium after they fell to Chaos corruption. The world was then declared Perdita (a Dead World) by the Imperium and placed under an interdiction to cordon it off from the rest of human space as ordered by the Ordo Malleus' Inquisitor Lord Hector Rex.The Folly of Pride (997.M41) - Hive Fleet Leviathan invades Forgefane, an Iron Warriors' world boasting some of the most redoubtable fortifications ever conceived. The Iron Warriors welcome the xenos challenge, arrogant in the belief that nothing can overcome their fortresses. Indeed, the Hive Mind's initial attacks are costly, and alien bodies litter every stretch of no man's land as strongholds and gun-emplacements vent their wrath. In response, the hive fleet unleashes subterranean swarms to tunnel beneath the Chaos defences. One by one, Forgefane's bastions are overrun by hordes of Raveners, and soon only the foreboding Ironblood Citadel remains, its foundations proof against the subterranean xenos. Undeterred, the Tyranids throw themselves at the walls; nine tenths are slaughtered beneath the fortification's fury but the aliens are seemingly without number and, within a week, even the Ironblood Citadel falls.Invasion of Ultramar (999.M41) - The Invasion of Ultramar occurred when a large Chaos warband known as the Bloodborn invaded the Ultramarines' Realm of Ultramar, headed by the Iron Warriors Warsmith Honsou and the Daemon Prince M'kar the Reborn, both servants of the Ruinous Powers who had sworn revenge against the Ultramarines for the past wrongs they believed had been done to them. The Chaos invasion occurred roughly concurrently with Abaddon the Despoiler's 13th Black Crusade in 999.M41, though the Bloodborn's invasion was not officially a part of the Black Crusade's forces. Ultimately this quest for vengeance was foiled as Honsou escaped and M'kar was banished back to the Warp by the Ultramarines.13th Black Crusade (999.M41) - The Iron Warriors Traitor Legion deployed in its entirety to take part in Abaddon the Despoiler's 13th Black Crusade against the Imperial Fortress World of Cadia. This resulted in the largest mobilisation of both Imperial and Chaotic forces seen in the Milky Way Galaxy since the Horus Heresy. The Forces of Chaos conquered large portions of Cadia for the first time, but remain trapped on the world by overwhelming Imperial naval superiority in the Cadian Gate.Second Siege of Hydra Cordatus (999.M41) - During the 13th Black Crusade a large Iron Warriors warband under the command of Warsmith Barban Falk and supported by a battlegroup of Chaos Titans from the Legio Mortis, including the infamous Imperator-class Titan Dies Irae, attacked the Adeptus Mechanicus Forge World of Hydra Cordatus which supplied weapons and other war materiel to the Imperium of Man at large. Hydra Cordatus was one of the few locations in the galaxy where the Mechanicus secretly stored its tithes of Space Marine gene-seed. Alongside his chief rivals Forrix and Kroeger, of the 1st and 2nd Grand Companies, respectively, Honsou was one of three champions of the Warsmith that laid siege to the large citadel and manufactorum complex known as the Tor Christo. Deep within this formidable Imperial citadel lay the stasis vaults which contained the genetic material drawn from the Iron Warriors' most hated and ancient rivals, the Imperial Fists. The Iron Warriors desperately needed this pure gene-seed to reconstitute their numbers as the corrupting power of Chaos tended to mutate their own gene-seed to the point that it was unusable to replenish their ranks with new Chaos Space Marines. Honsou was often belittled by his fellow Iron Warriors for having mixed gene-seed which consisted of spliced Iron Warriors and Imperial Fists genetic material. He was referred to by his fellows as a "half-breed", due to his gene-seed's mixed heritage. Despite the Imperial forces arrayed against them, including a large garrison of Imperial Guard troops and even a small detachment of Titans of the Legio Ignatum protecting its precious contents, in the end the Iron Warriors emerged triumphant. They defeated the Imperial forces defending Tor Christo as well as an entire company of Imperial Fists whom had arrived as reinforcements to try and prevent the theft of their genetic legacy. Having greatly pleased the Chaos Gods through his monumental victory over the Imperium, the commanding Warsmith of the attack on Hydra Cordatus was allowed to ascend to become a Daemon Prince. Before his final ascension to daemonhood, the Warsmith appointed Honsou as his successor, handing him command over his Grand Company. He then commanded Honsou to take the stolen Imperial Fists gene-seed back to the Iron Warriors' Daemon World of Medrengard within the Eye of Terror. After the Iron Warriors withdrew from Hydra Cordatus they bombarded the remains of the citadel to dust, leaving behind a lone Imperial survivor to tell the tale of what had occurred to his masters.The Grand Siege Begins (Unknown Date.M42) - In the wake of the birth of the Great Rift, the Daemon primarch perturabo unleashes great sieges on heavily fortified Imperial worlds across the galaxy. A vast stream of troops, materiel, vehicles and Daemon Engines flows from Medrengard out into the wider galaxy as the Iron Warriors once more make war upon the hated Imperium.Battle of Dysactis (Unknown Date.M42) - During the fyredust season on Dysactis, a vast Death Guard force advances through the pyroclastic storm fronts in search of the Temple of Ascension. They are met amidst the crackling maelstrom by an enormous force of Iron Warriors, supported by corrupt god-machines from the Legio Abhorrax. Continent-shattering battle ensues. Hordes of daemons are summoned from the beyond to join the fight. Beneath the gaze of the Cyclonead Statues, Mortarion and his fellow Daemon Primarch Perturabo themselves engage in a spectacular duel that lasts for seven solar hours. It is a battle reminiscent of the incredible conflicts of the Horus Heresy, and Perturabo's sons cause terrible damage to the Death Guard force. Yet the longer the fighting rages, the more the contagions and metaliphage poxes of the Death Guard spread through the Iron Warrior ranks. Ancient Heretics sicken and collapse. Malevolent war engines seize with rust and shudder, sparking, to a halt. Machine Spirits go mad with revulsion and pain, and as the powers of entropy and decay run rampant, the battle swings in Mortarion's favour. With his forces in tatters and many of his precious war engines crippled beyond repair, even bitter Perturabo is finally forced to concede defeat. Falling back to pre-prepared defence lines, he detonates a series of explosive trenches amidst the raging storms and disengages in the ensuing mayhem. Badly mauled but triumphant, Mortarion and his Death Guard lay claim to the heathen temple they fought so hard for, and the ancient secrets that lay at its heart.Talledus War (Unknown Date.M42) - When the Dark Cardinal of the Word Bearers Kor Phaeron offered the Iron Warriors the chance to invade the Talledus System in the Veritus Sub-sector, the Iron Warriors warband commanded by Warpsmith Etrogar were tasked with containing the Imperial forces at Ghreddask, the system's formidably defended Fortress World. The warpsmith saw the outer planets of the Talledus System as the perfect testing ground for newly perfected monstrosities -- the Soul Harvesters. These horrific creations were spaceborne fortress-factories that consisted of a central Daemonforge, surrounded by snaking tentacles of hellforged metal. These parasitic engines would embed themselves deep into a planet's crust, their boarding tentacles disgorging Iron Warriors into weak points in their enemy's defences.  Meanwhile, the roaring furnace at the structure's heart would feed upon flesh, metal and the souls of the slain in order to spew out fresh Daemon Engine reinforcements. As far as Kor Phaeron was concerned, this assault was merely a diversion for his grand assault upon the system capital world of Benediction. It would divide Imperial reinforcements, and secure the Dark Cardinal the time he needed to oversee the destruction of Benediction and its rebirth as a shrine of worship to the Chaos Pantheon. For his part, Etrogar had no interest in Kor Phaeron's grand ideological plans for the Talledus System. A ruthlessly practical soul, Etrogar saw the rampant psychic disturbance unleashed by the Great Rift not as a spiritual awakening for Humanity, but as an infinite source of power to be harnessed. The warpsmith entered Talledus at the helm of the Soul Harvester Scarax Krond. With its vast alpine ranges and city-sized citadel fortresses, the Fortress World of Ghreddask was the most heavily defended planet in the Talledus System, aside from Benediction itself. Its seven great hive cities provided billions of souls for the Astra Militarum, and its deep reserves of promethium and super-dense minerals only added to Ghreddask's critical value to the Imperium -- making it an irresistible target for Etrogar. The Scarax Krond latched onto the surface of Ghreddask like an immense parasite, thrusting pseudopods the size of habblocks deep into the earth. These snaking tentacles pulverised their way through rock and stone with siege drills and melta-cannons, before bursting up from the earth within the walls of Ghreddask's citadel fortifications. Heretic Astartes warriors marched forth, unleashing deadly volleys of bolt rounds into their unprepared foes. At the same time, Chaos Knights of House Khomentis lumbered from the gatehouse of Scarax Krond, bellowing oaths of destruction as they set upon the armoured formations of the Astra Militarum. Tank after tank was blasted into molten slag, and arcs of heavy bolter fire obliterated entire formations of Ghreddask Illuminators infantry. All the while the Daemonforge of the Scarax Krond glutted itself upon the psychic aura of death and destruction. Blasted corpses and twisted wreckages of shattered war machines were shovelled into its furnaces, as Etrogar and his fellow warpsmiths stoked the hellish fires with the souls of the slain. The Scarax Krond spewed out a tide of Daemon Engines, from scuttling, spider-like Venomcrawlers to hulking Maulerfiends that galloped into battle, eager to mutilate and destroy. Soon the Loyalists were in full flight, retreating to the polar citadel of Fortress Resolve, where they prepared to make their final stand. Just as the cruisers of the Iron Warriors prepared orbital bombardments that would blast open the last vestiges of resistance on Ghreddask, the Chaos fleet picked up a surge of Warp disturbance. Two enemy capital ships dropped out of orbit -- black vessels, bearing the stark white cross of the righteous Black Templars Chapter. Castellan Dramos led a single strike force detached from the Rutherian Crusade, all that could be spared due to the Black Templars' extensive campaigns elsewhere across the Segmentum Solar on behalf of other Shrine Worlds. Fortunately, Dramos could also call upon a cadre of Imperial Knights from House Mortan, commanded by the dour yet ferocious Sir Dirkwald. Dramos scanned the latest tactical cogitations broadcast from Fortress Resolve. The situation was grim. The Iron Warriors were besieging the polar citadel, pouring daemonic forces against its shield-walls while their siege tanks kept up a relentless bombardment. Yet the true threat, Dramos quickly intuited, was the Scarax Krond. Strike Force Dawnhammer would deploy in a decisive attack upon the Soul Harvester. The warriors of House Mortan made for the surface of Ghreddask in their fortified bulwark-landers, the heavily armoured vessels shrugging off reams of flak fire. Sir Dirkwald led a frontal assault upon the Scarax Krond. While the Knights drew the attention of the Chaos defenders, squads of Inceptors descended upon the Soul Harvester like living comets, burning through the upper atmosphere and locking coordinates upon the pulsing shell of the Scarax Krond. Castellan Dramos led the assault into the heart of the Scarax Krond, battling through the innards of the iron monster, alongside a retinue of veteran crusaders. Dramos and his Command Squad managed to detonate a cyclonic charge at the heart of the structure. The resulting Warp explosion swept through the Soul Harvester, immolating Loyalist and Heretic alike and blasting its assembly halls and charnel-factories to atoms. The Scarax Krond convulsed and thrashed its metal tendrils like a wounded animal, but its daemonic furnaces would not be snuffed out so easily. Dramos' sacrifice had bought the defenders of Ghreddask precious time, but the planet's fate still hung in the balance.