vizn3r/warhammer40k-lore huggingface dataset:
Calixis Sector - Ship Society: Life on the Misericord is defined by the castes into which the crew are divided. There are dozens of castes, each one responsible for a particular function aboard ship. Crewmen are either born into these castes or assigned to them on the few occasions they join from outside. These castes range from the Scourhand Brotherhood (who scrub the filth from the floors of the engine decks) to the Company of Imbeciles (the ship’s entertainers, consisting of various clowns, actors and storytellers). The officers of the Misericord form their own caste and wear distinctive and rather sinister masks to mark them out from the rest of the crew. Each caste has its own leadership, which reports to the officer caste, and the officers in turn receive their orders from the twin captains Anapollo and Luneros. The captains believe that the caste system is the reason the Misericord has survived for so long and are quick to bring anyone opposing it to trial. Castes are insular and proud, and sometimes they can come into bitter conflict, such as the regular skirmishes between the Lamplighters’ Guild and the Followers of the Wire over who gets to change the glowbulbs. All have their own baffling traditions, from the large wood and paper animal masks of the Obeyers’ Guild (the ship’s lawyers and executioners) to the ritual removal of an ear from every member of the Enginists (who maintain the ship’s temperamental engines). This latter ritual is said to be born of respect for a mythological Enginist of ages past, the heroic Bessimer “One-lug” Jone, who supposedly saved the Misericord from “dire disassemblage and ventation”.Most crew are true Voidborn and live their whole life on the starship. However, since the castes are not permitted to interbreed, the ship needs new crew members from outside to replenish the gene pool. Some older legends told on the ship remember the terrible “Age of Six Toes” when a mad previous captain refused to allow new blood onto the Misericord. Crew who join from outside -- referred to as “clayfeet” -- are both blessed and cursed. They are valuable to the crew and are given the least dangerous duties, but on the other hand they can never be regarded as true members of the Misericord’s crew, and are treated as outsiders no matter how long they serve on the ship. Only their children will be true Voidborn and thus full members of the crew.
Calixis Sector - The Misericord’s Castes: The castes into which the Misericord’s crew are organised are insular, specialised and hereditary. It is impossible to change castes and most crew are born into them. Old castes can be dissolved and new ones founded by the order of the captain, but some of the Misericord’s castes are as old as the starship itself. The ship’s castes include the following:The Lords, Siblings and Officers is the full name of the ship's officer caste. Members go everywhere masked, and assist the starship's two captains in making and enforcing decisions.The Merciful form the ship’s security wing, armoured in archaic plate and mail, and carrying ominous shotguns. They can change from impeccable politeness to extreme aggression instantly, even during the course of a mundane conversation.The Suturers' Parliament is the Misericord’s body of medical personnel. The Suturers practise their procedures on the starship’s small complement of live animals, so cats, pygmy Grox and other creatures wander around their sick bays and surgeries.The Immortals recover the bodies of dead crewmen, conduct void burials and investigate suspicious deaths. They enjoy reminding other crewmen of the fact that one day, they too will require the ministrations of the Immortals.The Communion of Ratters is dedicated to tackling the Misericord’s constant vermin problem. There are only a few crewmen among the Ratters, with the rest of the Communion being made up of old, patched-up ratting Servitors.The Renders are the Misericord’s cooks and they are also responsible for the livestock raised on the ship for food. The caste’s members take great pride in their food and are extremely vocal and sometimes violent in proclaiming the superiority of their personal recipes. No one argues like a Render.The Bringers of Silence are the only caste not to have a generally known purpose. They answer to the twin Captains of the vessel and are occasionally seen walking purposefully through the ship in midnight blue uniforms, their faces painted with stars.
Calixis Sector - Other Notable Sector Worlds: There are many worlds within the Calixis Sector. From the stretches of the Golgenna Reach to the dim coldness of the Hazeroth Abyss Sub-sector, there are many types of planet inhabited by Humanity. Some, such as the hive cities of Fenksworld, are well known to the Imperium, whilst others are all but lost, faded from Administratum maps or isolated by Warp storms.All have the potential to harbour miscreants, Heretics and other, darker forces. Unlike many folk in the 41st Millennium, Acolytes of the Inquisition may well find themselves ranging far and wide across the sector in the course of their duties.
Calixis Sector - 41 Pry: Pry is a gas giant, with a dingy Imperial void station in orbit, designated 41 Pry. The void station is a famous supply point and a seat of illegal activity. Ghostfire pollen is available here, at a price, if you know who to talk to. If you don't, such questions will get you killed rather swiftly.
Calixis Sector - 88 Tanstar: An Imperial Navy depot on an outlying colony world (population 78 million).
Calixis Sector - Acreage: Acreage is a Feudal World with sub-Imperial technology-levels, marked out across its continents in feudal demesnes ruled by despot warlords.
Calixis Sector - Baraspine: Baraspine is a small Imperial Hive World (population two billion) in the Adrantis Nebula Sub-sector. Its primary exports are cogitation cells and pottery.
Calixis Sector - Cloister: Cloister is an inhospitable world that is the site of a mendicant order of the Ecclesiarchy whose fraters occupy a vast bastion. The bastion is said to have been built by the Black Templars during the Angevin Crusade. Woe betide any inhabitants if the Astartes ever return to claim their property.
Calixis Sector - Dreah: The Agri-world of Dreah is noted the sector over for its grey skies, soil, plants and waters. Dreahans are notoriously dull, with pallid, greyish flesh and a sullen look to their faces. Merchants are able to make large sums selling exotic dyes to the Dreahans.More unsavoury merchants have found a ripe market for hallucinogenic drugs, as Dreahans are particularly fond of the bright colours such substances make them see. The planetary governor is attempting to crack down on this trade, with little success.
Calixis Sector - Dusk: The Feral World of Dusk is noted for the extreme hostility of its native creatures. "A walk on Dusk" has become a byword for horrible and painful death amongst certain Rogue Traders and Chartist Captains.
Calixis Sector - Endrite: The degenerate medieval populace of the Feudal World of Endrite worship the ruined hulk of an Imperial battlecruiser. It is not clear when this vessel crashed upon the planet, or what technological level its people were at before the disaster.
Calixis Sector - Fedrid: The thick forests of the Feral World of Fedrid are so dense and so teeming with dangerous carnivores that access is forbidden without a licence. Fedrid is a favourite of game hunters and those individuals procuring animals for the Imperial arenas.
Calixis Sector - Fenksworld: Fenksworld is a small, grimy Hive World to the coreward of the sector and the location of a substation depot of the Navis Imperialis' Battlefleet Calixis. It is suggested that many Chaos Cults and other "secret parties" test their influence on the Fenksworld population before moving on to more dominant worlds in the sector like Scintilla and Malfi. Cults and cult activity certainly fester here.Fenksworld's most notable feature is its Library of Knowing, one of the sector's most comprehensive sources of data outside the Prol System. The Library of Knowing's most significant attribute is that it is run under the ordination of the planetary governor and exists outside general Imperial jurisdiction. The Calixian Conclave of the Inquisition has made several (subtle) attempts to close the Fenksworld library down, due to its esoteric contents. The library remains a "family-run" enterprise, overseen by the planetary governor's Highborn dynasty, the mercurial House Vaahkon.
Calixis Sector - Ganf Magna: Despite many purge efforts, the wilderness of the Forest World and Frontier World of Ganf Magna retains several pockets of a Feral Ork infestation, left over from the last invasion. They exist as small, tribal units of monsters in the planet's dense forests. The Imperial settlers, mainly frontier farmers, wage a constant war with them.
Calixis Sector - Grangold: Grangold is a Dead World on which stands -- or, more appropriately, survives -- a single temple dedicated to Saint Drusus, despite the ferocious elemental squall. The temple is staffed by two ancient Dreadnoughts of the Iron Hands Chapter.The hazardous planetary environment and volatile staff make this a dangerous shrine for pilgrims of the Imperial Cult to approach, although it is said that "on Grangold, the saint answers all questions."
Calixis Sector - Heed: Heed is a Dead World and a battle site of the Angevin Crusade. The world is renowned for the noxious firestorms that pepper its surface.
Calixis Sector - Klybo: Klybo is an extinct world, where the ruins of a lost Human colony poke from the shifting sands. Klybo's harsh environment spurned all efforts to settle it. The Navis Imperialis' sector fleet maintains a waystation on a moon in close orbit.The name Klybo has become proverbial over the years, indicating a worthless or doomed effort. "It all went like Klybo" or "I tried my best, but I had a day on Klybo" are common sector euphemisms. Klybo attracts prospectors and tech-archaeologists. It is rumoured that fabulous STC finds are hidden on Klybo, remnants of the ancient, pre-Imperial colonial attempts to settle the world.Several myths report "walking monsters," akin to Ambulon, still striding the wastelands. No form of conclusive data has yet been obtained.
Calixis Sector - Landunder: The limp, untrustworthy planetary crust of Landunder floats freely on a deep chemical ocean. The Imperial colonies there are built to cling underneath the planetary crust in suspension. There are eight of these "hanging" undercities on the world, containing almost a billion inhabitants, with trade deriving from ocean-depth mining and chemical treatment (processing plants that exploit the curious mix of oceanic chemicals).
Calixis Sector - The Lathes: A trio of quasi-worlds at the hem of the Malfian Sub-sector, The Lathes are the foremost Adeptus Mechanicus Forge Worlds of the sector, rivalling Scintilla's Gunmetal City for weapons manufacture. The three planetoids, Het, Hesh and Hadd, enjoy an irregular orbit around their star, intersecting to produce events of hyper-gravity. At such times, industry goes into frantic production, as the commingled gravitational urges of the passing planetoids allow for the specialist smelting of rare metals and alloys.Lathe-world blades are famed throughout the Calixis Sector for their unbreakable character. Gravitational duress also accounts for the dense, armour-piercing quality of Lathe-world ammunition. These so-called "bodyblowers" are expensive and rare, and often purchased singly. The damage they can do to flesh is astonishing. Blades produced under gravitic circumstances on the Lathes are considered holy and special by the Tech-priests of the Mechanicus.Sector Lord Marius Hax owns a rapier of Lathe origin, presented to him by Magos Luol Rho, emissary of the Lathes at the sector court on Scintilla. It is rumoured that King Skull's sword is also an unbreakable tongue of Lathe manufacture.The workforce of the Lathes is surprisingly small but all those born and bred on those oddly tangling planetoids are meaty, squat and powerful in their demeanour, and built with heavy bones and mounds of flesh. The Lathes are held in the fealty of the Mechanicus of Mars, and are a secretive, closed environment. Visits require special permits and authority, and the Lathes are protected by a fraternity of warrior Tech-priests Dominus, who can call upon the power of Titans if the circumstances demand.
Calixis Sector - Lehyde Ten: Lehyde Ten is a pleasant, potentially arable world, which is generally unpopulated. Lord Militant Golgenna Angevin's early annexation surveys identified Lehyde Ten as an Imperial colonial target, but all attempts to land terraformer mechanisms on the world have resulted in failure. The landscape is littered with the dug-in, dormant hulks of Imperial land-makers. No one can explain the planet’s resistance to development. A small Imperial observatory station survives here, recording data from the Adrantis Nebula. The crew turnover is alarming: a year or two on the world will, inexplicably, drive a man insane.
Calixis Sector - Luggnum: Luggnum is a harsh and inhospitable Mining World with a small settlement called Lugg City which exports ores. Luggnum is the homeworld of the Astra Militarum regiments known as the Luggnum Sewer Rats.
Calixis Sector - Orbel Quill: An oddly serene, pastoral world of shepherds, flocks and herding where, curiously, no one lives beyond the age of forty years standard. Often thought to be a rumour or a joke, the “death threshold” of Orbel Quill is quite real. Visitors and travellers must beware, as often they are far above the age of forty in sidereal terms. Anyone forty or over is stricken with a terminal decline and dies within thirty-six hours, even visitors who have amassed their years during ship-time. Many speculate that the planet is governed by some deep-seated system that combs out what it perceives to be the elderly. Certain facts are evident: no one has managed to identify what it is that kills the over-forties on Orbel Quill. Whatever it is, it certainly does kill them without exception. Also, xenos ruins in the southern hemisphere of the planet have never been properly explored. It seems likely that it is no coincidence that Eldar have been regularly sighted in the empty quarters of this planet.
Calixis Sector - Prol IX: This crowded, reddish-brown world is the current seat of the scholastic order known as the Decatalogues of Prol. This ninth planet of the “Scrivener’s Star” is an ancient seat of the Administratum. Each of the nine planets is given over to record-keeping, collation, statistical analysis, archiving and the like. Space is running out on Prol IX leading to a vicious schism within the ranks of the Decatalogues. The Centurists wish to move to the forbidden tenth planet within the system, whilst the Pyratics wish to destroy the ancient files stored upon Prol I and raise new temples of information from the ashes of the old. Violent debate and long, impeccably researched discourses are being exchanged between the two factions. These written arguments -- some as many as one hundred and six volumes long -- are not helping the chronic shortage of space.
Calixis Sector - Seedworld AFG:218: Believed to be an Eldar holding, whatever the truth, Seedworld AFG:218 is evidently a place of geo-genic experimentation on the part of a xenos species. It is interdicted by a cordon of the Battlefleet Calixis.
Calixis Sector - Settlement 228: Settlement 228 is a new Imperial colony world (established four hundred standard years ago), seating eighteen thousand families on a dry, harsh settlement world. Though “cram beans” have proved a reasonably successful export crop, there is great unrest within Settlement 228’s plantation farms. The settlement families, all exported from Scintilla, believe they were sold their land rights fraudulently. They claim that the planet is nothing like as viable as they were led to believe from the surveys. There is a strong anti-Imperium groundswell here and a hard-bitten drive towards revolution.
Calixis Sector - Sleef: This outworld, close to the Scarus Sector border, is unninhabited. However, it is famous for its sulphurous volcanic vents, through which, it is said, the voice of the Warp whispers. It is said the skin of reality is thin there and one might hear the vibration of the Immaterium, just out of reach.
Calixis Sector - Spectoris: Spectoris is an Ocean World with a thriving Imperial habitat, constructed on top of a submarine peak. With two million population this is the sector’s largest exporter of fish and fish-meal product. The “Complete Ocean” of Spectoris is the subject of many legends, with some saying that there are sentient xeno forms of vast size inhabiting the unexplored depths of the world. Others claim that the world-ocean itself is sentient.
Calixis Sector - Threnos: Despised by Chartist vessels and Navigators, a satellite relay surrounds this star system, blasting Imperial liturgy into the void of space upon all manner of frequencies. No one has travelled to the interior of Threnos’ thirteen planets for some millennia, though it is rumoured to be lifeless.
Calixis Sector - Tranch: Tranch is a minor Hive World located in the Adrantis Nebula, home to a long-lasting and vicious civil war.
Calixis Sector - Vaxanide: Situated at the edge of sector territory, Vaxanide is a poorly supplied, desperate world, struggling to enter the “inner circle” of sector planets. It has decent mineral output and considerable exports of meat and fish, but it fights to survive. Its three billion population answers to Lord Vaxanide, scion of House Vaxanide, which has holdings on Scintilla, Malfi and Regulus. The economic degeneracy of Vaxanide results in it being a generally lawless, dangerous Frontier World, especially beyond the precincts of the central hive city, Vaxanhive. The planet is especially famed for its porcelain, glass and fish products. It is also the site of a shrine to Saint Drusus, where miracles are said to occur. Base rumours say that a hidden city exists in the canyons of the dense equatorial jungles. The city is said to be a mirror of the Lucid Palace, populated by phantoms of the actual Lucid Palace’s denizens. All expeditions into the jungle areas have ended in failure, with few members returning alive. Those who survive are usually insane, raving of “grey death” stalking them, or simply ending their lives in a variety of messy ways.
Calixis Sector - Woe: Woe is an extremely hazardous Death World.
Calixis Sector - Zillman's Domain: Zillman's Domian is a low technology level Feudal World with a heavy Imperial Tithe burden. Existence on Zillman's Domain is agricultural and frugal. The king owns a Lasgun, which makes him the king. The Domain is famous for its brutality and medieval mindset and accidental visitors are often burned at the stake as witches for possessing such mundane items of Imperial technology as vox-links. The Domain was "visited" by the Spectral Sun in 807.M41.
Calixis Sector - Sector Currency: The Imperial currency of the Calixis Sector and many of the surrounding regions in the Segmentum Obscurus such as the Koronus Expanse is known as the "Throne Gelt." There are also precious shell tokens or coins of rare, strategic metals that are accepted as legal tender on all of the civilised Imperial worlds of the sector. Thrones can also be dispersed in electronic form as payment, usually by using a data-slate.One of a number of sector and segmentum-based Imperial currencies whose value directly relates to the Administratum's audits of tithes in the region where the currency is used, the worth of Throne Gelt is secured against the massive riches generated by Imperial planetary tithes, and is locally issued in the form of coins known as "thrones."A currency consists of whatever objects are a common unit of exchange in a given locale -- government coinage, ephemeral digital ledger-data, ammunition, gold nuggets, or shells picked from a beach. The currencies of Mankind are as varied as the worlds of the galaxy they inhabit, and are only measured in thrones when it comes time to collect the Imperial Tithe.Human reavers and pirates across the frontiers of Imperial space are often refugees or descendants of settlers from the Imperium, and so understand Throne Gelt's value. Of course, to these Renegades, offering currency in trade without a display of force or at least a little bloodletting first is a sign of weakness. Yet some Renegades, dark corsairs and slavers among them, favour hacksilver, items of technology, ammunition, and slaves as currency -- or trapped souls and bottled vitality, if the darkest stories are to be believed.Xenos also have their currencies, though their interpretations of this concept may be remote and strange. The vile Orks, for example, counts wealth in "teef" -- literally the teeth of enemy Greenskins kept for noisy, threatening trade with "dem 'ard gits what got the bitz we needz." By comparison, the deceitful Aeldari kindreds do not appear to employ any form of monetary currency at all, and are said to find such Human concepts of valuation primitive or debased. Aeldari do value certain items -- particularly the lost artefacts of their species.However, attempting trade with Aeldari of any kindred is a harrowing experience, with the negotiations ever treacherous and shifting. Perhaps of all the xenos known to Mankind, the nomadic Stryxis have the most "Human" outlook on trade. Though strange to look on, Stryxis caravans offer an often bewildering variety of goods, many perilous and outright prohibited within Imperial space. However, their inscrutable masters drive a hard bargain, and are never to be underestimated.
Calixis Sector - Power Groups: Several groups in the Calixis Sector hold power that is not restricted to one planet, but can be felt across the whole sector. These include the adepta of the Imperium, as well as the five Great Houses, which are as old as the Calixis Sector itself.Members of these groups can turn up on any of the sector's worlds, and they all possess enough resources to make themselves major players in the sector's complex tapestry of political power.
Calixis Sector - Adeptus Terra: The Adeptus Terra is nominally the most important group in the Calixis Sector. As the "government" of the Imperium of Man, the Adeptus Terra's members are responsible for ensuring that the Calixis Sector fulfils its obligations to the Imperium: offering up the correct tithes of materials, manpower and psykers, obeying Imperial laws and never harbouring the Emperor's foes. Lord Sector Marius Hax is the Sector Governor and he appoints the sub-sector commanders who oversee the various areas of the Calixis Sector in Terra's name.Commander Hax himself answers to the commanders of the Segmentum Obscurus. Through this connection, Hax can request military aid from the Astra Militarum or Navis Imperialis, or even the mighty Space Marines. However, unless he has strong evidence that the Calixis Sector is in immediate peril, his requests will not be answered. On a smaller scale, Commander Hax could have considerable sway over many of the sector's adepts, such as members of the Adeptus Arbites or the Ecclesiarchy. Though Hax traditionally rules in a "hands-off" manner, this influence is not to be underestimated.
Calixis Sector - Adeptus Ministorum: The Adeptus Ministorum is a powerful force in the Calixis Sector, as it is in most regions of the Imperium. The area is sacred to Saint Drusus and is a destination for pilgrims from many sectors around, with many of its most notable places being religious in nature. Arch-cardinal Ignato is energetic in keeping up the numbers of preachers and confessors active in the sector and these promulgators of the Imperial Creed's word are the most common adepts by far on most of the sector's worlds.Many planets have their own cardinal and these form the Sector Synod, headed by Arch-cardinal Ignato, which rules on all spiritual matters affecting the Calixis Sector. Pious, Emperor-fearing citizens abound and pronouncements by Ignato or the Sector Synod can be disseminated by the clergy and reach the ears of the average citizen far more effectively than through any other means.The majority of Calixian citizens perform some act of worship regularly, from trudging along to a dingy temple once a solar month to nightly prayers in a noble's private chapel. Most permanent places of worship are home to a member of the Ecclesiarchy, which means that the Ecclesiarchy's priests are numerous and strongly connected to the population in a way that no other adepts are. On worlds where priests are lacking (such as Sepheris Secundus) much of the day-to-day preaching is done by lay clergy, pious individuals trained and deployed by ordained Ecclesiarchy clergy to spread the word in places where even a devoted preacher baulks to tread.While there are few places in the Calixis Sector where the Emperor's word is not preached, the scattered nature of the priests and the use of lay clergy mean that strict dogma is not always observed. Sometimes the teaching of the Imperial Creed can drift away from the Ecclesiarchical line. On Sepheris Secundus, for example, the barons and the queen are sometimes portrayed as sacred beings imbued with the Emperor's power by lay preachers who grew up in the planet's rigid feudal system.On Iocanthos, mercenaries pay fealty to the Emperor as their paymaster, while in Scintilla's underhives, countless versions of the Emperor are worshipped, from a fearsome god of destruction appeased with murder to the spirit of the hives themselves. While the Imperial Creed reaches everywhere in the Calixis Sector, in truth Arch-cardinal Ignato and the other cardinals of the Sector Synod often have to strive hard to maintain orthodoxy there.
Calixis Sector - Cult of Redemption: The Adeptus Ministorum's preachers are in short supply in the very deepest, darkest parts of the Calixis Sector's cities. Instead, another religious force brings the fiery word of the Emperor to these forsaken places, one that operates well beyond the reach of the adepta: the Cult of Redemption. Many consider the Redemptionists to be the true terror of the underhives, rather than the bandits, mutants or criminals.Violent zealots who see sin everywhere, the tactics of the Redemptionists are simple: they roam the underhive putting sinners to the flame, holding impromptu stake-burnings, exhorting the fearful underhivers to give up their friends and relatives to the purifying fire, and preaching impassioned sermons about the intolerance of the God-Emperor and the wickedness of anyone who does not agree with the Redemption's point of view.The Redemption's masked foot soldiers are clad in red robes and are armed with anything that burns, from lit torches to flamers. The most "blessed" among them carry the Eviscerator, a massive two-handed chainsword, with which to mortify the flesh of sinners. Many Redemptionists are broken-minded souls who have lost everything to the violence of the underhive, and seek solace and vengeance in the religious hatred promised by the cult.The Cult of the Redemption is strong in many areas of the Imperium and was probably brought to the Calixis Sector by zealots making a pilgrimage to the Cathedral of Illumination on Scintilla. It is active on several planets, but its spiritual home is Scintilla. The cult is organised into many "crusades," each led by a charismatic leader called a "deacon." Though the crusades operate independently, they all recognise the authority of one woman in the sector, the Archdeacon Ludmilla.
Calixis Sector - Great Houses: The term "Great House," or "Sector House," refers to those civilian organisations that have a presence across the Calixis Sector. This sets them apart from "planetary" or "lesser" houses, which might wield enormous power on a particular planet but do not have any particular influence elsewhere.In the earliest days of the Calixis Sector, all the Great Houses, and most of the planetary houses, were based around Imperial noble families. The old Great Houses were enormous extended familial lines, with strict rules of heredity to maintain their monopoly on power.In the current days of the 41st Millennium, several of the Great Houses are actually corporations. They may act as if they were noble families but the truly hereditary Great Houses are quick to point out that their memberships are based on ambition and skill, rather than bloodline.The Great Houses play their own game of politics and wealth, and with their thousands of members and private troops, they have the potential to exercise enormous power in the Calixis Sector. Some dominate whole worlds and some harbour ambitions that will one day pit them against the interests of the adepta of the Imperium.
Calixis Sector - House Krin: House Krin are "Drusus' Bankers," a very old and close-knit family whose immense fortune stems from offering banking and loans to the other noble houses. They are possibly the oldest of the Great Houses still to have a sector-wide presence and are sharp in their criticism of the "new money" that has so much power in the present-day sector. There are houses on almost every planet that rely on House Krin to help maintain their own finances. The conspicuous expenditure of Hive Sibellus, for example, would be impossible without House Krin loans, and the DeVayne Incorporation could not purchase the rights to generations of Sepheris Secundus' serfs without House Krin advancing them the funds to do so.House Krin keeps itself to itself but its estates can be found on a great many Calixian worlds. They are not as lavish as those of other houses, as their position is secure enough for them not to rely on such vulgarity to ensure their position. House Krin has a sizeable body of agents in the Goldenhand in Hive Tarsus on Scintilla and keeps smaller taskforces anywhere they can use their large amounts of accessible wealth to make more money.Many Calixian nobles are certain that House Krin must have a vault somewhere filled with unimaginable wealth, and even suggest that the house's senior members view this accumulation of gold with religious awe, but if any of this is true, the location of the House Krin vaults is a closely guarded secret. Similarly House Krin's most important members rarely deal with anyone outside the house, preferring to have lesser members deal with "outsiders" (a fact that does little to endear them to nobles from other houses).
Calixis Sector - Cestelle Alliance: The origins of the Cestelle Alliance lie on the world of Regulus in the Hazeroth Abyss sub-sector. Regulus was an Agri-world run by the Administratum but when their adepts were all killed by a meteor impact, the small feudal kingdoms took over the management of their world. By the time contact with the Imperium was re-established, it was clear that the alliance of indigenous peoples was running the Agri-world more efficiently than the Administratum, and the natives of Regulus were left to their own devices as long as their tithe of food was met.From this string of events was born the Cestelle Alliance, the unified people of Regulus, who sent members to other, less promising worlds and transformed them over the following decades into fertile Agri-worlds in their own rights, passing on enormous tithes to Sector Governor Marius Hax's government. Slowly, almost without the other Great Houses knowing, the Cestelle Alliance amassed the wealth and power to make them the equal of the other sector noble houses.The Cestelle Alliance now controls many Agri-worlds in the Calixis Sector. It has not escaped the notice of Lord Sector Hax that the Alliance, if it wished, could cut off food supplies to the sector's most populated worlds and create a crisis of famine to hold the sector to ransom. To keep the Alliance firmly on the Imperial side, Hax has appointed Egoyan Cestelle as the Governor of the Adrantis Nebula sub-sector and continues to permit the Alliance rights to its Agri-worlds.The members of the Alliance must walk a curious tightrope between maintaining the traditions of their homeworlds and kingdoms, and acting like fully recognised nobles of the Calixis Sector. The traditions of Regulus include facial tattooing (with the higher-ranking nobles sporting extraordinarily intricate scrollwork), incinerating the house's dead on funeral pyres and praying to the Emperor in the raucous manner first taught to the people of Regulus by Imperial missionaries.The Alliance participates in the sector's games of politics and etiquette, even though it is considered little more than a gang of primitive yokels by most other Calixian nobles, but they are very reluctant to allow any interference on the planets they control, even resisting visits by Imperial adepts to their Agri-worlds.Those few who have gone to a Cestelle Alliance world have sometimes reported wide-eyed tales of abased rituals around giant burning effigies. The Alliance goes to great lengths to show a sophisticated, aristocratic face to the Calixis Sector but some say they are unable to completely hide their primitive side. The colours of the Cestelle Alliance are red and golden yellow, and their emblem is a sea of crops, gently bending in the wind.
Calixis Sector - Machenko Dynasty: The Machenko Dynasty, an extended family organised along strictly hereditary lines in the manner of the old noble houses, is the most mysterious of the Great Houses. Seventy-five standard years ago the dynasty’s patriarch, Lord Scelestes Machenko, was accused of witchcraft, heresy and impiety, and burned at the stake. The dynasty fell with him, its estates invaded by rival families and its wealth confiscated by the Administratum. The dynasty spent the following solar decades rebuilding itself, and its members have kept its record scrupulously clean since the Machenkan Purge.Although a dark shadow hangs over the dynasty because of its past, no one has ever been able to find evidence of impiety during the dynasty's return to power. The source of the dynasty's wealth, with which it funded its return to Great House status and currently plays the great games of sector noble politics, is a complete mystery and the source of the darkest of rumours. Certainly the dynasty owns a great deal, from hive spire estates to tracts of land, but it does not seem to control any Agri-worlds or manufactoria with which to make the money it so clearly has. When questioned about the source of the dynasty's capital, Machenkan nobles reply (with impeccable politeness) that they keep their own counsel about such matters.The members of the Machenko Dynasty have turned etiquette into an art form and house scholars compile great volumes of etiquette, which Machenkan nobles carry around with them by means of a Lectern-servitor. So complex are the dynasty's ritualised greetings and forms of address that nobles from rival houses often claim they are some kind of secret code.In any case, the Machenkan nobles dismiss the great mysteries of their house with charm and politeness, and without exception make for gracious guests and accommodating hosts. As dark as the rumours about them may be, few nobles turn down an invitation from the dynasty. The Machenko Dynasty's symbol is a ringed planet and its house colours are a deep blue.
Calixis Sector - Skaelen-Har Hegemony: Skaelen-Har is a massive corporation founded on a set of comprehensive philosophical principles known as the "Concordium." The Skaelen-Har Hegemony is a very powerful and efficient heavy manufacturing corporation with concerns across the Calixis Sector, including hundreds of manufactoria in Hive Sibellus and Gunmetal City on Scintilla. One of its major products is voidship parts and the Imperial Navy's Battlefleet Calixis in particular relies on Skaelen-Har to keep its warships in space. The connection between the Imperial Navy and the Hegemony is strong, since without the Hegemony the Battlefleet Calixis would be completely grounded.Every member of the Hegemony follows the Concordium, a set of strictures that emphasise the realisation of an individual's potential through the destruction of his personality. The Concordium describes an "ideal" personality as obedient but ambitious, amoral and unmoved by emotive arguments, decisive and unforgiving. People who display these traits, claim Skaelen-Har, are those most likely to succeed in the 41st Millennium.A member of Skaelen-Har is required to gradually put aside their own personality in favour of the precepts of the Concordium. Their original personality is only permitted to emerge in controlled environments at Skaelen-Har gatherings. Members of Skaelen-Har are recruited from all strata of Imperial society, as long as they have the potential to accept the Concordium. They then advance up the strict Hegemony hierarchy, with the higher circles being composed of those who have abandoned their personality completely.These higher circles form the leadership of Skaelen-Har and with their Concordium so in control there is little dissent or indecisiveness displayed in the Hegemony's activities. Skaelen-Har members make for excellent naval officers and there are many in the Battlefleet Calixis, but many in the officer class are suspicious of the Hegemony's motives in placing so many of its members on the sector's warships.Members of Skaelen-Har are all required to give up a part of themselves to the Concordium. To symbolise this, they all have a body part replaced, usually a hand or facial feature. The replacements range from simple prosthetics for lower-circle members to state-of-the art bionic augmentations for the most devoted followers of the Concordium. Skaelen-Har's members wear the Hegemony's colours of black and silver and bear the symbol of a silver starburst.
Calixis Sector - Forces of Chaos: The Calixis Sector appears to those with the perspective to perceive such things to be seething with Chaos Cult activity, each of its worlds tainted with countless heretical and blasphemous bodies. Some point to the spectral haunting of the Tyrant Star as the cause of this endemic corruption, while others have come to believe that the star might represent some form of stellar executioner drawn to the concentration of sin and ready to enact the final judgement upon the guilty.Some suspect that the entire region has always been tainted, even before it was settled by Mankind. They hold that Lord Militant Golgenna Angevin fought long and bitter wars against an empire of debased, Chaos-worshipping aliens whose name has been struck from all records (now confirmed to be the Yu'vath) and that some taint of them remains to poison the souls of Humanity in the sector.Of late, those who tread the path to glory have begun to flock to the spinward marches of the sector, drawn there by the new war in the so-called Spinward Front of the Periphery that, if allowed to do so, might one day engulf the entire sub-sector. Warp-worshipping cults and Heretic warbands are mustering on the verges, and some even claim to have sighted the Tyrant Star, its ghostly black halo shimmering in the void.Most of those who tread the path to glory of Chaos are to be found operating within the existing structure of the Calixis Sector's institutions. They exist at every level, from the Inquisitor who has strayed too far into heretical doctrine to the data-loom operator who harbours a murderous hatred for the overseer who denies them a solar hour away from their workstation to attend a loved one's funeral.A lay-tech denied access to the inner workings of the machine they operate may turn to the Logicians, an outcast splinter of the Cult Mechanicus, for knowledge otherwise forbidden to them. Idle nobles the sector over collect illicit xenos curios, any one of which might harbour some taint that poisons the soul and leads to damnation. Those born bearing the mark of the mutant might not have been created inherently evil, but many experience such brutal Imperial oppression that the Ruinous Powers offer the only means of survival in a galaxy of bloodshed and hardship.Nowhere within the Calixis Sector is beyond the reach of the Ruinous Powers, from the sanctums of the Abbey of the Dawn on Iocanthos to the secret cloisters of the Daemon-hunting Inquisitors of the Ordo Malleus. No planetary governor is immune to the whispers of Daemons that haunt them by night, promising undreamed-of power in return for just a few "favours."No Adeptus Arbites Judge enforcing the Emperor's laws on the cruel streets of the hive bottom is so zealous as to be able to ignore the desire to simply burn the entire hive city down, purging the guilty and the innocent at once. Chaos is everywhere, but a thought and a promise away, ever ready to consume the souls of the weak and empower those of the strong beyond mortal imagining.
Calixis Sector - Calixian Conclave: The branch of the Inquisition that watches the Calixis Sector is known as the Calixian Conclave. Overseen by Lord Inquisitor Aegult Caidin, its High Council and Officio are based in the Tricorn Palace on Scintilla. It has many sub-officios and a grim fortified outpost can be found on or near most major or highly populated planets.Sub-officio administrators are known by the rank "Planetia Inquisitor" and control local conclavium councils that resemble the High Council in miniature. The Calixian Conclave has troops, spacecraft and Acolytes at its disposal, but its most valuable commodity is its Inquisitors themselves, who possess skills and authority beyond the imaginings of most Imperial citizens. The Calixian Conclave watches over the whole sector and there is no limit to its jurisdiction.It should be noted that, despite the governing hand of Caidin and the High Council, the Inquisitors of the Calixian Conclave are not all of the same mind. They are independent souls, set on individual missions and enterprises. Each one has very strong ideas about the way the Inquisition should conduct itself and the length to which they must go to preserve the Imperium. Some become outright enemies and no two have exactly the same agenda. Should they ever pull together they would form by far the greatest power block in the area, eclipsing even the great noble families of the sector in the resources they can muster.Until that happens, the Inquisitors of the Calixian Conclave are their own worst enemies, scheming against one another or pursuing their goals in secret, using their Acolytes as playing pieces in games of superiority. Some of the Calixian Inquisitors are noble and pious, exemplars of Imperial values, others are more free-thinking or, as a Puritan would put it, corrupt. Anyone of them could be the Calixis Sector's greatest saviour or its most notorious villain. Caidin and the High Council do their best to keep the scattered Inquisitors moving with a unified purpose, but sometimes they have to arbitrate disputes.
Calixis Sector - Tyrantine Cabal: The Tyrantine Cabal was commissioned many years ago in response to the dread prophesy of the Tyrant Star. Its members are known as Tyrantites or Spectarians (or more dismissively as star gazers), for they are charged with investigating apparitions of the spectral sun and the influence of the baleful Tyrant Star. The Tyrantine Cabal is based at the Bastion Serpentis, a bleak fortress of age-polished black stone jutting from the surface of Scintilla’s moon Lachesis. The Bastion is typical of the Inquisition waystations and local fortresses peppered across the Calixis Sector. The Spectarians were granted sole discretionary use of the Bastion Serpentis at the inception of their cabal. Lord Sector Hax, Chief Astropath Xiao and a few others know of its existence, and those who do not are kept away from the moon by dire warnings about geological instability. Lord Inquisitor Anton Zerbe can normally be found at the Bastion and it is there in its grand audience chamber that he holds the semi-regular meetings with all the Cabal’s Inquisitors, at which they report on their activities and share information. These gatherings are as much a venue for making allies and enemies as they are a forum for exchanging intelligence on the sector’s various threats and power groups.As the threat of the Tyrant Star is felt across the Calixis Sector, the membership of the Cabal is not formally fixed. Some Inquisitors, those listed here, have stayed in the Calixis Sector for some time and accept Zerbe’s authority (although they do not all obey him by any means). Other Inquisitors might join on a temporary basis, especially if an investigation elsewhere brings them to the Calixis Sector in matters intersecting the Hereticus Tenebrae, while some simply come to lend their support while they tap the expertise of the Cabal’s most experienced Inquisitors. The individuals listed here are confirmed Spectarians, but Inquisitors join and leave all the time, with Zerbe’s blessing.
Calixis Sector - Calixian Sub-sectors: The following list contains all of the sub-sectors of the Calixis Sector and the worlds that can be found within them.
Calixis Sector - Adrantis: Baraspine - Hive WorldMarioch - Frontier WorldKormisoshi Dockyards - Void Station - Located to the coreward of TranchCoseflame - Feudal World - Chasm city-states, famous for the high quality of its ore exportsGrangold - Dead World - Suffers from continual acid stormsHippocrasian - Agglomeration Void Station - Orbiting Morwen VILehyde Ten - Frontier World - All Imperial attempts at colonisation to date have failedMortressa - Death World - Home of renowned "Scythewind" Astra Militarum regimentsMorwen VI - Dead World - Used as a training ground by certain regiments of the Brontian Longknives of the Imperial GuardOmnicron 71-DX - Forge World - Near the Adrantis NebulaPerinetus - Forge World - Floating zero-gravity forges exist in orbit of Perinetus for spacecraft repairsPiety of Seth - Shrine World of the EcclesiarchyReth - Pleasure World - Part of the Tephaine SystemSiculi - Agri-world - Part of the Tephaine System, many of the world's lakes produce a crop of Protoalgia that is a popular basic foodstuff on Imperial Hive Worlds across the galaxySkorgulian - Forge WorldSoryth - Mining World - Frozen gas mining of methane, hydrogen, helium, argonTephaine - Hive World - Part of the Tephaine System, capital world of the systemTephaine Minor - Agri-world - Part of the Tephaine SystemTranch - Hive WorldVolonx - Feral World