Sanguinius - The Great Crusade: No mere warriors were the primarchs -- they were also shrewd and canny leaders of men, under whose command the righteous might of the Space Marine Legions increased a hundredfold. So it was that the Great Crusade surged onwards as never before. New battlefronts opened up under the Primarchs' direction and worlds were reclaimed by the thousand.Throughout it all, the Blood Angels and their Primarch, Sanguinius, fought at the Emperor's side, serving as honour guard to their beloved creator. Driven by a fiery temperament, the IXth Legion swiftly earned a fearsome reputation as shock troops, which came to feed a rivalry between them and the assault-oriented World Eaters Legion. Yet, in truth, the Blood Angels were never as ferocious as the World Eaters, for the wise influence of Sanguinius tempered their bloodlust.After being introduced to all of his fellow Primarchs, over the long Terran decades of the Great Crusade, Sanguinius formed the closest bonds with his brothers Horus, Leman Russ and Jaghatai Khan and the Blood Angels also forged close ties born in blood and battle with the Luna Wolves, Space Wolves and White Scars Legions, respectively. Though he was yet in the early days of his legend, Sanguinius was thought to be the noblest of the Primarchs and was ever deep in the Emperor's counsel.Even Horus, proud Warmaster of the Great Crusade and Primarch of the Luna Wolves, sensed a purity of spirit in Sanguinius that he could never match, a oneness with their genetic "father" that no other Primarch could ever hope to approach. Whilst many of his brothers fought the Great Crusade solely out of the joy of battle, Sanguinius fought to secure the golden era of peace and prosperity which would surely follow. His vision was the Emperor's, a hope of Mankind united in peace and prosperity. Alas, it was not to be.As the Great Crusade pushed outward, and more primarchs were discovered, the Emperor's time became divided, pulled in more and more directions by the demands of organising the growing Imperium. Horus, the most favoured son of the Emperor, was often placed in overall strategic command of the Crusade, a position in which he proved his skill as a leader time and time again. He quickly won the approval and support of the other Space Marine Legions, along with that of their leaders.One of the burgeoning Imperium's greatest victories occurred during the Ullanor Crusade, a vast Imperial assault on the Ork Empire of the Overlord Urrlak Urruk. The capital world of this empire, Ullanor Prime, the site of the final assault, lay in the Ullanor System of the Ullanor Sector, which had long been under the dominion of Urrlak Urruk's Greenskin pocket empire. The Ullanor Crusade included the deployment of 100,000 Space Marines, 8,000,000 Imperial Army troops, 100 Titans of the Legio Mortis and 600 starships of the Imperialis Armada and their support personnel.Upon the successful conclusion of this most lauded of Imperial victories, Horus was raised by the Emperor to the rank of Imperial Warmaster and given command authority over all of his fellow Primarchs and every Expeditionary Fleet of the Great Crusade. Following the victory celebrations at the Triumph of Ullanor and the elevation of his most favoured son, the Emperor retired to Terra to pursue his secret Imperial Webway Project which was intended to open up the Aeldari Webway for human use so that the Imperium would tie Mankind together as never before in history, as well as cutting Mankind off from the nefarious influence of the Warp once and for all. But the Primarchs would never come to terms with the Emperor's absence. Their hurt feelings over his seeming abandonment of the Great Crusade to pursue a secret project, whose purpose he chose not to reveal to his sons, laid the seeds of corruption that would ultimately blossom into the Horus Heresy.Following the corruption of Horus by the Chaos Gods after his mortal wounding upon the plague moon of the Feral World of Davin, he began to lay the seeds for his coming rebellion, to overthrow the Emperor, and eventually assume the Imperial throne in his bid to rule the galaxy. In the midst of the darkness of the Horus Heresy, the Blood Angels never wavered, but held true at the Emperor's side.