Salamanders - Shadow of a Veiled Creation: As with several of the proto-Legion groupings in the closing stages of the Unification Wars, much remains unknown as to the exact Founding and intake of the XVIIIth Legion. Beyond the usual secrecy and security that the Emperor chose to surround the Space Marine project with, in order to protect the nascent Legiones Astartes both from hostile action and from potential espionage, the origins and early deployment of several early Legion gene-strains are further occluded beyond the modern record's sight.These Legion-groups were formed and established largely in separation from the rest, and it is generally thought created to very specific ends. There were none save perhaps a handful of the Emperor's closest and earliest confidants surviving from those lost and bloody days who knew the facts regarding this mystery, and the truth likely died with them.The  XVIIIth Legion, that was known for some time as the "Dragon Warriors," and would later become known as the "Salamanders" after the rediscovery of their primarch, along with the VIth (Space Wolves) and XXth Legions (Alpha Legion), comprised this group of proto-Legions. That this "trefoil" of three proto-Legions was somehow veiled from the rest during their creation and establishment was something known to their fellows, but by edict of the Emperor and His agents, it remained unspoken of openly.This element of mystery surrounding them can be seen to establish a distance between the three and the other Space Marine Legions, at least subconsciously in the minds of their fellow Astartes, particular in regards to their earliest intake of initiates (around which dark rumours circled), which would later blossom into a level of distrust. This distrust would magnify for very different reasons in regards to what would later become the Space Wolves Legion and Alpha Legion over time, but would be ameliorated in the case of the Salamanders by their later conduct and the influence and person of their gene-sire, the Primarch Vulkan.However, this was not so in their early days, and it is forgotten now by most that at the outset of the Great Crusade, in ca. 798.M30, the reputation being forged by the  XVIIIth Legion was a far more bloody and bellicose one than they would later carry. In many ways, the pattern of their early fate was set and prefigured by the first major battle for which they became publicly identified; the Assault of the Tempest Galleries in the dying days of the Unification Wars on ancient Terra.In this, the Legion alone achieved a victory against impossible odds and survived, although barely, taking savage losses which reduced the newly invested Legion's active strength from around 20,000 to little more than 1,000 warriors, although in doing so they secured themselves a place of glory and honour in the roll of the Imperium's forces. The Legion's strength was rapidly rebuilt with new waves of recruits, their victorious reputation seeing them favoured for the procurement of new wargear and supply, often over many of their peers but, regardless, the pause kept them from participating in the initial explosion of expeditionary fleets departing Terra during the early years of the Great Crusade.Instead, the XVIIIth Legion was often deployed piecemeal as fresh chapters of the Legion were readied and pressing demands called for Space Marine involvement. This meant that for the first few solar decades of the Great Crusade, Legionaries of the XVIIIth were assigned across a considerable number of different reinforcement battle groups and specialist units such as Rogue Trader expeditions, and rarely fought together as a Legion. In particular, they were used to add Astartes might to emergency interdiction taskforces sent in to deal with sudden threats arising "behind the lines" of the advancing crusade, such as deadly space hulks appearing without warning from the Empyrean, or in response to xenos corsair raids and rising dangers unexpectedly disturbed by a fresh Human colonising presence in a star system.In many of these cases, the warriors of the Legion would be the only Space Marine contingent taking part in the conflict, forcing them into close co-operation with other Human forces (often in a command and spearhead role), and inevitably plunged them directly into the heaviest fighting and most hazardous theatres of battle.Seldom then did the XVIIIth fight on a battlefield of their own choosing, and while Imperial Compliance actions for the Legion during this time were few and far between, its roll of battle honours was extensive, as was the diversity of its foes and the victories it secured. For the  XVIIIth this created a paradoxical reputation both as saviour but also as a herald of bloody deeds, forlorn hopes and last-ditch holding actions. For an Imperial Army unit to be assigned alongside the  XVIIIth Legion was a sign that the forthcoming battle would be a murderous affair; be it to break a siege, interdict a counterattack, or hold the line against an alien onslaught in order to protect a civilian population from massacre.Against the foes of Humanity there was no odds the  XVIIIth would not face, no drop of blood it would not shed, no sacrifice it would not make in terms of Legionaries or materiel in order to serve the Great Crusade and protect Mankind. This kind of asymmetrical battle, it was soon whispered by some of their contemporaries, had become an addiction of sorts to the Legion and their valour less glorious as it had become almost suicidal in temper.Regardless of the truth of this assertion, it was plain that to the XVIIIth Legion, to triumph against the odds was the only victory worth the name. In the worst instances, such as the legendary Manticore Cataclysm, retreat for the  XVIIIth became often unthinkable even when tactical expediency would dictate otherwise, and the Legion paid in blood for its own untenable standard of valour and service.Their resultant reputation is known to have won them great favour in certain circles of the Imperial Court and High Command while others, such as Lord Commander Actia of the XIIIth Legion (Ultramarines), bitter after the events of Manticore, is on open record as stating that the XVIIIth carried the seeds of their own destruction within them. He claimed they were no more reliable ultimately than the quixotic Vth Legion (White Scars), whose control would increasingly cause difficulties for the Great Crusade, or the IIIrd Legion (Emperor's Children), who had yet to have their gene-seed deficiencies repaired by the finding of their primarch.In addition to the influence of the Legion's interrupted development and evolution, attrition would ensure that in these early solar decades of the Imperium, the  XVIIIth Legion's numbers never fully developed in the manner of others, battlefield losses preventing them from ever reaching the nominal full strength accorded by the Imperial High Command and War Council, while its warriors and officers remained distanced from those in the other Legions through a combination of circumstances and choice.Increasingly overmatched in number and superseded by others, by the fourth solar decade of the Great Crusade, whether the  XVIIIth Legion would ultimately survive was a matter of open debate in some quarters.