Darnath Lysander - The Invasion of Taladorn: The Iron Warriors had not sat idly by whilst Lysander had levelled their holdings. An influential new warlord had risen to power amongst Perturabo's sons. With promises of revenge and dark glory, he raised a new army -- the Sons of the Forge -- from the remnants of warbands crushed by Lysander's hammer-blows.No one but this warlord knew why the manufactorum world of Taladorn was chosen, save perhaps as an object lesson in needless malice. There was certainly no military goal beyond the stark application of terror, a reassertion of the Iron Warriors' might following a string of defeats.The fleet of gunmetal battleships struck Taladorn without warning, pounding the world's defences into rubble before unleashing wave after wave of Dreadclaws onto the planet's surface.Drop ships in the shape of tentacled dragons followed, their coiled feelers flailing as they sought purchase amongst the manufactorums’ upper towers. As the vessels settled into position, Warpsmiths struck runes of containment from the passenger bays, and snarling Daemon Engines spilled into the city streets.Defence commanders mustered what forces they could, but troops recruited to confront the violence of gangs, smugglers and pirates were of little use against the monstrosities that now tore their regiments to red ruin. Valkyries, operating from a hidden airbase on the polar continent, screamed south to engage a second wave of renegade drop ships, but were swatted from the sky by the Heldrakes that swooped and dove upon Taladorn's volcanic thermals.Taladorn Primus, seat of the Planetary Governor, surrendered after less than a solar day's fighting. Before the week was out, almost all the other cities had petitioned for mercy. Only Taladorn Decimus, located in the extreme south, still stood unconquered. Built as it was into the side of an obsidian mountain, its defences had ridden out the bombardment better than those of its fellows.Any Dreadclaw that landed within range of Decimus' guns was blown apart by shellfire, and any drop ship or Heldrake that entered its skies risked obliteration by its impressive array of defence lasers.Yet, stalwart as it was, Decimus could not offer assistance to its fellows. Thus did its inhabitants watch helplessly as the Iron Warriors set about enslaving the population, praying all the while that the storm of iron would leave them untouched.In the following weeks, the Iron Warriors wrought great change upon the planet. Taladorn Primus was overrun by coiling mecharoots, woven together to form a vast domed structure over the ruins. This had become the "Forgeheart," an imposing citadel beneath which the Iron Warriors' grafted bond-slaves -- men and women who had embraced damnation for promises of mechanical apotheosis -- fed the bellowing Daemon forges night and day.The previous inhabitants -- those who still lived -- now toiled beneath Taladorn Sextus. This blasted ruin was now little more than a forced-labour mining complex, squatting amongst the rubble and supplying precious ores to the rapacious Warp-foundries beneath the Forgeheart. By the time the Imperium responded, millions had perished in the mines, and the mecharoots had spread to cover almost the entire southern continent. Taladorn was well on its way to becoming a new fortress world.