vizn3r/warhammer40k-lore huggingface dataset:
Chaos Cult - Crimson Brotherhoods: The Brotherhood of the Knife was the largest and most effective of the Warp cults deployed by the Word Bearers to Calth. As with others of its kind, it was brought to the muster under the guise of second-line Excertus Imperialis Levy Auxilia, with an entry given to the muster as classification "Light Infantry/Terrestrial Sub-type/Feral-Feudal Regressive."The cult force was, it appears, organised into between 10-20 sub-sects, each at least 10,000 strong. The members of the Ushmetar Kaul had already gained something of a reputation as a most bloodthirsty and brutal fighting force alongside the Word Bearers during their later Imperial Compliance actions of the Great Crusade, and they were recorded as engaging in the most violent rites before, after and even during battle.The excesses attributed to these forces during the Battle of Calth -- particularly by the harrowing accounts of civilian survivors -- speak of the Brotherhood of the Knife fighting clad in rags soaked with the freshly-spilled blood of sacrificial victims, which were as likely to be drawn from their own ranks as from captured enemy combatants.Others had daubed arcane symbols on their skin with blood or had hair matted with clotted viscera; the by-products of mutilations and acts of furious cannibalism beyond the countenance of any sane mind.Many bore ceremonial blades and other melee weapons, and the more senior wielded ritual weapons since classified under the general term Athame, fashioned of jagged stone or strangely alloyed iron.Such weapons were by unknown means specifically attuned to the realm of the Warp, so that every death they inflicted was an offering to feed the empyreal entities with which the cult was in communion, and by the act of killing, they sought to breach the barriers which separated the material realm from the Immaterium.It is believed that the Ushmetar Kaul proved itself a key component in the vast ritual of which the death of Calth was but the opening phase, its thousands-strong cohorts being deployed into the many cities and provinces across the surface of Calth, from Numinus to Talanko.The brotherhoods fought in close coordination with their Word Bearers masters, either serving as an expendable first wave or to clear entrenched foes by weight of numbers, butcher the wounded and round up prisoners for sacrifice.They were also fearsome and skilled fighters, and while individual cultists were no match for a Space Marine, they had the advantage of numbers and were driven by their twisted creed to perform deeds beyond the endurance of mortal soldiers.With each death inflicted by the Ushmetar Kaul, Lorgar's grand ritual to create the Ruinstorm was progressed an increment more, making the Brotherhood of the Knife as useful in an occult sense as it was in a military one.
Chaos Cult - Gene-Bound: Perhaps the most unusual of the cultic sects engaged at the Battle of Calth were the Mandari, about which very little is known, for the manner of its members' devotions left little behind in the way of evidence that might be studied.What is known from examining captured fragments of their "sacred texts" from the bodies of the dead is that the rank and file of the Mandari -- the so-called "Gene-kin" -- were bound by some aberrant combination of technology and genetics to the service of the Warp in such a way that they believed utterly they would be re-born immediately after their deaths into a new and glorious form.The Word Bearers, it appears, promised the Mandari Gene-kin that they were in essence immortal. While a great many of the Warp cults committed to the Battle of Calth and elsewhere likely held similar beliefs, those of the Mandari were far more than dogma or esoteric metaphor.Accounts submitted by Ultramarines units following the Battle of Calth and the subsequent Underworld War describe incidents of spontaneous mutation of a singular character far beyond the most extreme cases of bio-aberration previously recorded by Imperial savants, up to and including the bodily re-vivification of the dead.Forensic examination of recovered corpses by the XIII Legion's Apothecaries obtained during the Underworld War also record numerous medical anomalies, such as unnecessary surgical interventions and seemingly non-functioning implantations of extraneous foreign matter.The process by which these individuals underwent change was far from certain, yet in time the defenders of Calth came to recognise the hideous effect. Within a period of a few solar minutes to several solar hours after death, the body of the slain might begin to convulse and then thrash, bones snapping and flesh distending to the extent of acquiring additional mass by unknown means.Ruined flesh would re-knit, the fallen Mandari becoming a bent, split and twisted thing which bore little resemblance to the Human form and that moved across the ground in an entirely unnatural rapid gait and was impervious to pain and trauma.Killing the returned Mandari took bravery, discipline and concentrated fire, and the defenders of Calth soon learned that only severe trauma inflicted to a Mandari cultist's central mass would ensure the horrific process did not occur.By their very nature and the fact that they could only be killed by the most destructive of means, the reanimated Kaul Mandari proved impossible to study.
Chaos Cult - Abrial's Claw: Warsmith Baldurn is an outcast of the Iron Warriors since his defeat at the Fortress of Ventemar on the Daemon World of Medregard. Balduran has been seeking the means to rebuild his standing.When the forces of Chaos overran the world of Makenna VII, he used his share of the spoils to build up the strength of his Grand Battery. With so many war machines under his command, he planned to return to Medrengard to crush those that mocked him.He fought alongside the infamous Chaos Renegade Abrial Shard, who swore an oath of brotherhood to the Warsmith long ago on a Daemon World at the heart of the Eye of Terror.Baldarun called upon his old ally to bolster his forces upon Makenna VII, and Arbial sent a detachment of his own personal elite Chaos Cult warriors, known as Abrial's Claw, on the condition that Balduraun relinquished the secrets of his beloved technovirus to Shard's cultists.Whether they survived to return the secret to their master is another matter.
Chaos Cult - The Admonition: The Admonition, also known as the Cult of Admonition, is a Chaos Cult dedicated to Nurgle, the Chaos God of disease and despair, that exists within the lower and middle reaches of Hive Tertium, the primary hive city of Atoma Prime, the capital world of the Moebian Domain of the Imperium.The word "admonition" means a firm, authoritative, or harsh warning, reprimand, rebuke, or counsel. What could this warning or counsel be that the cult offers to the people of Atoma Prime? The majority of the Heretics of the cult encountered by Imperial forces spout some line mentioning "truth." This "truth" is likely what the cultists admonish the population to accept -- the insane ideology of Nurgle, which basically calls upon mortals to embrace the inevitability of rot, decay, disease and death in order to be freed by the Plague Lord of the fear and despair such outcomes produce.In the Era Indomitus, the Admonition unleashed a Zombie Plague and the Walking Pox upon the hive city and a swarm of Zombies and Poxwalkers soon began to assault the lower reaches of Hive Tertium. To deal with the Undead threat, the elite Moebian 6th Regiment was redirected from frontline deployment in the Fringe War to assist in combating the Nurglish corruption.Instead, the Chaos-corrupted Astra Militarum regiment turned on the people it had sworn to protect and began to support the uprising as a Traitoris Militarum force dedicated to overthrowing Imperial rule on Atoma Prime and spreading the dark "truth" of Nurgle and Chaos to all its people.To stop this growing corruption, the Inquisition under the command of the Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor Grendyl recently deployed its forces, including large groups of Acolytes, into Hive Tertium in a race against time to save the hive city before the cult's corruption can grow into a cancer that could consume the entire world, or even eventually threaten the entire Moebius Domain.
Chaos Cult - Black Hand: The Black Hand were a cult fostered by Fexrath, the leader of the Third Claw of House Cull of the Night Lords. Since Amon Cull's forces were perpetually low on manpower, Fexrath had volunteered to take the most savage of the survivors of the Night Lords' brutal recruitment harvests and forge them into a ruthless warrior cult dedicated to the sadistic narcissism that permeates the VIIIth Legion to enhance House Cull's force levels.The Black Hand saw action during the attack on the prison world of Zartak and faced the unrelenting savagery of the Carcharodons' 3rd Company.
Chaos Cult - Blood Pact: The Blood Pact is a Chaos warband devoted to Khorne, differing from other such war bands in that they follow an unusually disciplined way of life. They can be found on the so-called "Sanguinary Worlds" of the Sabbat Worlds Sector, primarily around the world of Ghourra.Unlike many Chaos Cultist warbands, the Blood Pact fights as a disciplined army against the onslaught of the Astra Militarum's Sabbat Worlds Crusade, and this is what makes them so effective compared to the usual disorganised Chaos masses.Consisting of highly trained, vicious soldiers and xenos mercenaries, the soldiers of the Blood Pact know no fear or hesitation. They have overrun entire worlds and caused the people of the Imperium no small amount of suffering and woe during the Sabbat Worlds Crusade.The Blood Pact's adherents, like their allies among the Sons of Sek, possess an unusual view of Chaos theology. They do not hate the Emperor as an enemy of Chaos, but venerate him as another embodiment of the Warp.They believe the Emperor to be simply another Warp entity like a Daemon or the Chaos Gods themselves. They see Him as a misguided prophet for Humanity who has seen the power of the Warp but who mislead His followers into believing that it should be opposed.The Blood Pact and their allies believe that it is the holy task of their cults to spread the truth about the God-Emperor and the Warp and to bring the people of the Imperium back into the fold of worship of the powers of Chaos, because in truth they are already venerating a creature of the Warp.For these cultists, the Emperor is already akin to the entities they worship, for He, too, is powered by the Warp and has been changed by his contact with the Immaterium. For these cultists, the Emperor is actually a symbol of what they aspire to, as they wish to become one with the Warp and be forever changed by this communion.Thus, in their belief system, the "schism" of mistaken faith embraced by the Imperium must be healed and Humanity brought back into the embrace of Chaos. They hold that the Imperium does not need to be destroyed, but only reformed so that it understands the true nature of the Warp and its inhabitants.In this view, the Imperial Creed has led the people of the Imperium down the wrong path for millennia, and the Blood Pact and their allies believe that they are engaged in a war to defeat its gatekeepers so they can teach Humanity the truth of the enlightenment that Chaos offers -- and that they have already been worshipping without realising it.
Chaos Cult - Brotherhood of the Horned Darkness: The Brotherhood of the Horned Darkness is a dangerous and highly organised malefic cult whose origins and activities go back according to some sources to the founding of the Calixis Sector and quite possibly beyond. This cult has been repeatedly smashed time and again over the centuries only to appear again some years or solar decades later.Membership, size, form, and power may vary, but it is always recognisable in its core beliefs and the object of its worship -- the Daemon Balphomael, the Horned Darkness.The brotherhood, known to some as the "Pact of Balphomael" or the "Black Society," is recognised by the Ordo Malleus as a near-archetypical Daemon-worshipping cult, although often better resourced and more dangerous than most.Appealing to the nobility and the ruling elite who tend toward ambition and megalomania rather than jaded excess or forbidden pleasure, Balphomael's supplicants are often austere, driven, and dangerous individuals who obey their daemonic master's teachings and feed his hungry demand for sacrifice and suffering.In the past, multiple groups worshipping the daemon have been in existence at the same time, either kept in ignorance of each other or set up as rivals to prove their worth, depending on their daemonic master's whim.
Chaos Cult - Carnibales: The Carnibales are a Chaos insurgency native to the Shrine World of Solo-Baston which began to trouble the planet when the Ecclesiarchy, the ruler of the world, started appropriating land from the indigenous population for the church's agricultural use.In reality the rebellion was instigated by the Dos Pares, members of the Blood Gorgons Chaos Space Marines. The Carnibales were able to very quickly massacre the Solo-Baston Planetary Defence Force (PDF) who had not expected the insurgency.Eventually the Astra MIlitarum was called in to put down the rebellion, however their efforts proved futile because the Carnibales had captured the super heavy Earthwrecker siege gun, which allowed them to thwart any attempt by the Imperial forces to land on the main Solo-Baston landmass.Though initially none of the Imperial authorities suspected the insurgency was aided by the forces of Chaos, the increasing number of mutants among the Carnibales fighters and the growing number of shrines to the Dark Gods made this fact blatantly obvious.
Chaos Cult - Chem-Hunters of Messia: The inhabitants of Messia live in a world blighted with industrial pollution and utterly inhospitable to Human life; yet Human life persists and has taken root within the twin cities at the planet's poles.Life in these cities is hard and heavily dependent on expeditions that continuously scour Messia's blasted wastelands to secure precious promethium.Such expeditions are made up of the hardiest of Messia's inhabitants and it is from these that the Chem-Hunters arise. Chem-Hunters are veterans of the unforgiving wilderness of Messia and offer their invaluable services as raiders and escorts to the drill-barons.They are consummate riders and skirmishers, frequently seen operating attack bike escorts or clinging to the rigs watching for roaming mutant hordes.The majority of Messia's population view them as daredevils at best and suicidal at worst. However, there is no denying that they are accomplished survivalists and valued additions to any warband.The Chem-Hunters of Messia are skilled and deadly killers who are used to surviving in spite of desperate odds. They tend towards wild and reckless behaviour, seeming to care little about the potential pitfalls of their actions.These nomads operate as mercenaries and guides that sell their services to the highest bidder, which on Messia usually means working for the notorious promethium drill-barons. They are also proficient mechanics, most having to salvage and repair their vehicles under rather frantic circumstances.Despite the many extreme dangers, life on an expedition offers a great degree of freedom from the constant degradations of Messia's cities. Chem-Hunters are constantly exposed to all manner of pollutants and toxins in the scorched wastelands, and, should they survive, become naturally resistant to such chemicals.However, these individuals also suffer from a unique poisoning that makes them dependent on the very compounds that afflict their bodies. The exact nature of this toxin is unknown; some, however, speculate that it may be related to the phenomenon that spawns the planet's roving mutant hordes.
Chaos Cult - Children of the Merciful Lord: The Children of the Merciful Lord were a Chaos Cult who paid homage to Nurgle. This cult was responsible for the war with the Imperium on the world of Cordassa.
Chaos Cult - Children of Sanguinary Unholiness: The Children of Sanguinary Unholiness was a massive Chaos Cult of Khornate Berserkers dedicated to the service of the Blood God Khorne which joined the Daemon Primarch Angron and his World Eaters Traitor Legion aboard the Space Hulk Devourer of Stars to launch an invasion of the Hive World of Armageddon in the Segmentum Solar in 444.M41.These cultists were drawn from the population of the Daemon World controlled by Angron and the World Eaters within the Eye of Terror and they were used to supplement the forces of daemons and Chaos Space Marines that Angron used to launch what would become known as the First War for Armageddon.The Children of Sanguinary Unholiness numbered in the millions but were ultimately defeated through the actions of Armageddon's mortal defenders amongst the Imperial Guard and its Planetary Defence Forces and the assistance of the Space Wolves and Grey Knights Space Marine Chapters.
Chaos Cult - Cognitae: The Cognitae was a Chaos Cult which took the form of an academy, run by its founder, Lilean Chase. The Cognitae's aim was to develop "by means psychic, eugenic and noetic," a generation of individuals who would work to further the aims of Chaos in the Scarus Sector.Every graduate of the Cognitae was both highly intelligent and extremely dangerous. According to Criol Fowst, a senior member of the Ushmetar Kaul in the 31st Millennium, known also as "the Brotherhood of the Knife," the Cognitae, or some similar version of it, has existed within the Imperium for millennia, as far back as before the Great Crusade. The Cognitae also spawned several offshoots and imitators.Their most notable "graduate" was Zygmunt Molotch, a cunning and vicious anarchist and enemy of the Imperium. The arch-foe of Inquisitor Gideon Ravenor, one of his ultimate goals was the mastery of the forbidden language of Enuncia. He battled Ravenor across the Scarus Sector for many Terran years, faked his death several times and was immensely difficult for Ravenor to kill.In recent days, the Cognitae Heretics have converged under the figure known as "The King in Yellow," using horrifically powerful technology and a hitherto unknown mastery of Enuncia to an end that could annihilate the entire Imperium. Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn, one of Chaos' greatest foes, has sworn to shatter the Cognitae's design by any means necessary.
Chaos Cult - Covenant of the Blessed: The Covenant of the Blessed was a Chaos Cult based on the planet Periremunda. Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor Killian managed to take control of the cult sometime before the 930s.M41, and used it as a source of experimental subjects for his research into the Shadowlight.This ancient artefact was able to grant psychic abilities to a fraction of the Humans who contacted it; the Radical Inquisitor Killian hoped to use created psykers to battle Chaos with its own weapons.Most of the cult was killed when the planet was attacked by Tyranids, either directly by assorted bioforms or purged by the Imperial forces defending the world. Killian himself was declared Excommunicate Traitoris and was killed by the Shadowlight as he attempted to flee with it.
Chaos Cult - Cult of Amber: The Cult of Amber had existed on the small world of Unctious for millennia, believing that even the snail's pace at which the Imperium changed was too fast, and that only by embracing stasis and stagnancy could their great civilisation be preserved for eternity.The cult's members included high-ranking politicians, bureaucrats and officers within Unctious' planetary government, and all devoted themselves to preparing their world for the time when the skies would darken and the great Lord of Amber would stretch out his hand to claim his prize, preserving the planet for evermore and elevating his most beloved worshippers to the pantheon above.The Amber God was, perhaps unbeknownst to its cultists, a face of Nurgle, whose provenance was antipathy to change. Over the millennia, this parochial cult had been infiltrated and turned by agents of the god of decay, so that the cultists opposed change in all its forms and begun to work far more openly -- and widely -- to not only maintain the status quo but to encourage regression and stagnancy.Towards the end of the 40th Millennium, the cult performed a dreadful rite, summoning the Lord of Amber -- Nurgle itself -- who indeed manifested upon the world of Unctious, bringing decay in all its forms.As Nurgle moved to seize the worlds within the Corvus Sub-sector, it was thwarted by the Lord of Change himself. Tzeentch plucked at the Warp and drew it about the shoulders of the sub-sector, snatching it from Nurgle's sickly grasp, and scattering the planets and breaking the conjunction, denying the Plague Lord its prize.Nurgle snatched the world of Unctious and Magister Thrax as its consolation and returned to the depths of the Warp.
Chaos Cult - Cult of the Angel of Fire: The Cult of the Angel of Fire was a Chaos Cult that flourished on the worlds of the Krask System in the early 41st Millennium. Forsaking the teachings of the Imperial Cult, the sect leaders of the cult believed they were in contact with a being known as the Angel of Fire, the messenger of the Emperor, but who in fact, was actually a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch.Gaining a popular following within the Krask System, the Planetary Governors were overthrown and theocratic regimes were installed. Those who spoke out against the cult were placed in cages and burned alive. During the Macharian Crusade, the Imperial forces of Lord Solar Macharius encountered fierce resistance from the Cult of the Angel of Fire.As their inevitable defeat loomed ever closer, the cult priests succeeded in opening a Warp rift, which allowed the Lord of Change masquerading as the Angel of Fire, to emerge into the Materium. Macharius's forces managed to defeat the daemon and its summoned minions, as well as closing the rift. Afterwards, the Cult of the Angel of Fire quickly fell apart. It was not clear whether the cultists were ever aware that their entire faith had been an immaculate deception created by the Ruinous Powers.
Chaos Cult - Cult of Frantic Flensing: In 928.M41, High Praetor Osh'preen's disastrously lax reign over Dulma'lin opened the way for an heretical uprising by the Slaaneshi Cult of Frantic Flensing. The Astra Militarum Catachan II Regiment were the only regiment close enough to offer assistance but, thanks to a mysterious series of communication failures that bedeviled the Catachans, Osh'preen and his corrupt government were left to their remarkably horrible fate.
Chaos Cult - Cult of the Red Talon: In 855.M41, after the Cult of the Red Talon arose on Antraxes at the command of their daemonic master, the Lord of Change, M'Kachen, it was Brother-Captain Arvann Stern who led the counterattack. Striking at the heart of the cult's temple, Stern and his Battle-Brothers held true to their quest.Though outnumbered, the Grey Knights slaughtered the Cultists to the final damned soul. At the last, the mighty M'Kachen was defeated, banished screaming back into the Warp by Stern himself -- a formidable feat normally thought beyond the psychic abilities of a lone Brother-Captain. M'Kachen vowed to devour Stern's mortal soul in revenge, and they have battled many times since.
Chaos Cult - Cult of the Scarlet Vein: The Cult of the Scarlet Vein was a Chaos Cult that was confronted by the Relictors Space Marine Chapter when they were still a part of the Imperium. It was a bloody battle, which only Artekus Bardane survived. Bardane was finally elevated to the rank of Chapter Master at the recommendation of his predecessor, who was mortally wounded in the final battle against the Cult.
Chaos Cult - Cult of the Severed Tongue: In 713.M36, Tzeentchian Daemons robbed the populace of Sundel of speech, every citizen rendered mute by Warp sorceries. In the silence that follows the Cult of the Severed Tongue is born, its debased members torturing and killing men and women with no voices to scream. For a year the cult reigned without opposition, turning the planet into a silent hell where corpses rotted in the streets and men and women lived like vermin in the shadows, fearful of making the slightest sound that will give them away.The Grey Knights confronted the cult as Sundel stood on the verge of utter destruction, its cities completely given over to worshipping the very daemons that orchestrated their ruin. In the empty silence, the only sounds to be heard were the bark of Storm Bolters and the crackle of Force Weapons as the Grey Knights purified the planet and annihilated any in their path.
Chaos Cult - Cults of the Crimson Slaughter: It did not take long for rumour of the bloody deeds of the Renegade Chapter known as the Crimson Slaughter to spread across the vastness of the Imperium like wildfire. The desperate and the dispossessed clung to the tales -- gravitating towards any beings that could stand up to the harshest regime Mankind had ever known. Others -- the more debased and depraved of their lot -- chose the Crimson Slaughter for they saw that the Renegades were strong.In the 41st Millennium, where total war is a way of life, it pays to ally oneself to the most formidable faction available. So did cults rise up and dedicate themselves to the red-handed Renegades. To them, the Crimson Slaughter are manifestations of the Dark Gods themselves. Mutants, exiles, and hive gangers in their millions have set off in quest to prostrate themselves before the most fearsome of the Renegade Chapters -- the Crimson Slaughter.Most never make it. The galaxy is a dangerous place, and as merciless as the Imperium is to such Traitors, the Chaos Space Marines are far worse. Most cultists are slain on sight, destroyed for pleasure, ritual, or the whims of the Renegades. Some few, however, have found and joined the Crimson Slaughter -- at least until the mortals' overly ingratiating presence no longer serves any useful purpose. The Cult of the Red Disciples, the Cult of the Red Haze, the Bloodbathers and Dirtdogs make up but a few of the thousands of different cultists that serve the Crimson Slaughter.
Chaos Cult - Death Priests of Mire: Of the various worlds within the Screaming Vortex that exhibit signs of Nurgle's pestilent touch, few are as prominent as the barren and blighted planet of Mire. Here the squalid denizens forage aimlessly amidst endless foetid pools of festering muck and decaying vegetation, their diseased bodies enduring solely due to Nurgle's unnatural ministrations. Perhaps the most dangerous of these are the so-called Death Priests who prey upon their fellow Mirens in order to perpetuate their disgusting adulation of the Plague God's bountiful corruptions.Death Priests feed on the bodies of their victims in order to nourish the parasites, diseases, and other foul poxes that writhe in their bloated guts. They believe these afflictions to be a blessing from the Plague Father. On Mire, they see it as their unholy duty to hunt down the so-called "Pyrions" -- clean ones -- and devour them.After slaying any foe, though, they usually gorge themselves on every scrap of putrescent sustenance to feed the ravenous diseases that wrack their ghoulish forms. These feculent warriors are highly prized within the debased warbands of the Screaming Vortex, and many opportunistic slavers exploit their infamous enthusiasm for slaughter by luring these voracious killers off-world with promises of fresh carcasses to consume.
Chaos Cult - Divine Fratery: The Chaos Cult known as the Divine Fratery that comprised several thousand members had spread throughout the Angelus, Antimar, Helican and Ophidian Sub-sectors by the 400s.M41. As worshipers of the Ruinous Powers their primary goals were to spread, by any means necessary, anarchy and chaos in order to facilitate the disintegration of the Imperium.They were obsessed with the art of divination in order to discern possible futures, and, whenever one promised disaster, the Cult did everything in its power to ensure that the tragic event came to pass and to maximize consequences. As part of their initiation, members of the cult had to remove one of their eyes, and then craft a patch to cover their remaining one, made of special material and to exact specifications, before they could receive medical treatment.If they survived this stage of their initiation, the missing eye was replaced with an augmetic version for everyday use, while the remaining eye was left covered, to be used only during divination rituals. The Divine Fratery anticipated the coming of the Daemon Prince Slyte, who clashed several times with Inquisitors Gregor Eisenhorn and his pupil, Gideon Ravenor.
Chaos Cult - Exilarchy: The Exilarchy is a great army of Human Chaos Cultists, Traitoris Militarum and mutants that also counts several warbands of Heretic Astartes among its number. It was active in the backwater Elara's Veil sector of the Ultima Segmentum in the Era Indomitus.The leaders of the Exilarchy are the warband of Chaos Space Marines known as The Pure, who were the survivors of a Loyalist Space Marine Chapter called the Star Scorpions that had been native to the world of Khamun-Sen in the Veil. The Star Scorpions' entire Chapter fleet had been lost in the Warp, and the survivors later returned to realspace as the Chaos Space Marines of The Pure.The Pure use the mortals of the Exilarchy as foot soldiers and cannon fodder to further their cause, which is to claim the entirety of the Elara's Veil region as a new Chaos realm under their direct control. In the aftermath of the Great Rift's creation at the dawn of the Era Indomitus, the Pure and the Exilarchy were expelled by the Warp into the region of Elara's Veil.The twenty Human-settled worlds of that sector were controlled by the Imperium, but The Pure sought to colonise them with the troops of the Exilarchy to create a new stellar empire dedicated to Chaos in a warped version of their former dedication to protecting the region. This brought them into direct conflict with their former brethren among the Adeptus Vaelarii, the "Sentinels of the Veil," which now included the Emperor's Spears and Celestial Lions Chapters, charged, as the Star Scorpions had been, with protecting the worlds of Elara's Veil.However, after over a standard century of warfare between the Chaos and Imperial forces experienced due to the temporal instability caused by the Great Rift in the region, and primarily due to the sheer size of the Exilarchy forces, roughly half of Elara's Veil is now under The Pure's control. The Adeptus Vaelarii continue to valiantly hold the line against these servants of the Archenemy, but only time will tell if they will be able to maintain their vigil successfully, for both Chapters are depleted forces trapped on the Imperium's benighted frontier in the Imperium Nihilus.
Chaos Cult - Ghol Voluptara: On the world of Baraspine, located in the Calixis Sector, a Pale Throng-style revolt by the mutant castes used to tend the wind-blasted Impellor Towers that dotted that world's barrens threatened to plunge the hives into darkness.The Baraspine rising was later revealed to have been backed and instigated by a secret malefic sorcerer cult, the Ghol Voluptara. The cult used the anarchy and distraction caused by the insurrection as a cover for a series of dark rituals which were only prevented by the combined forces of the Adepta Sororitas and the ruling executive's household troops.
Chaos Cult - Hidden Hand: The Hidden Hand is a Chaos Cult dedicated to the Plague Lord. They believe Mankind is a disease, spreading across the galaxy like a stain. The gods have turned from the filth of their presence. They believe it must be cleansed so that the gods will pour their bounties upon Humanity once more, and pestilence and plague shall be the tools for a thief to catch a thief, a plague to kill a plague -- poisoning the wells, defiling the air, passing contagion by touch to all those who pass by. When the corpses finally outnumber the living, the Cult will light the fires of purification and pass their souls unto the netherworld to take their pleas and prayers to the gods.
Chaos Cult - Hollow Cult: In 290.M34, during their long war against the Slaaneshi Hollow Cult and its many-limbed pleasure god, the Grey Knights lost almost the entire 7th Brotherhood. The cult laid a series of cunning ambushes for the Grey Knights, bending reality to isolate each of the Battle-Brothers and overwhelm them in a tide of daemonic flesh.The Grey Knights' retribution is absolute, and Supreme Grand Master Calastan gathers the full might of the Chapter against the cult. In the end, the only memory of the Hollow Cult that remains is recorded in faded ink within the Sanctum Sanctorum in the Citadel of Titan.
Chaos Cult - House Glaw: House Glaw was a former noble family of the planet Gudrun located in the Helican Sub-sector in the Segmentum Obscurus. Pontius Glaw was the seventh son of house patriarch Oberon Glaw, who was corrupted by Chaos and led a cabal of Slaanesh cultists that eventually turned the attention of the Inquisition towards his activities. Inquisitor Absolom Angevin and his retinue tracked down Pontius and his cabal with the aid of House Glaw, who sought to distance themselves from their heretic kinsman.The hunt for Pontius eventually ended with his death. Over the next two centuries, House Glaw was investigated multiple times, as they had never fully escaped suspicion. Even though they cooperated with Inquisitorial investigators, Chaos activity in the sub-sector eventually led back to Gudrun and House Glaw. Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn eventually discovered that the entirety of House Glaw was corrupted by Chaos and that the new Lord Oberon and his brother Urisel were involved with powerful Chaos benefactors, including Chaos Space Marines from the Emperor's Children Traitor Legion. When word reached Inquisitor Commodus Voke, the puritanical Inquisitor called upon the Imperial Guard and Imperial Navy to conduct a purge of Gudrun, and House Glaw was all but wiped out.
Chaos Cult - Infardi: The Infardi were Chaos Cultists native to the planet Hagia in the Sabbat Worlds Sector. They took their name from a local word for pilgrim and wore robes of emerald green which mocked that Shrine World's Imperial faith. They were tattooed with images of Saint Sabbat in congress with daemons and Chaos runes. They were led on Hagia by their general Pater Sin.It is presumed that the Infardi were destroyed upon activation of the psychic amplification device beneath the Shrinehold of Saint Sabbat, save for Pater Sin, who had fled Hagia some days before. Infardi is also the Hagian name for pilgrims of Saint Sabbat.
Chaos Cult - The Ironclad: The Ironclad are a large movement of Chaos pirate raiders active in the Medina Corridor who are also dedicated to the service of the Ruinous Powers and the spread of their faith.
Chaos Cult - Kith: Led by Magister Sholen Skara, the Kith was a genocidal Chaos Cult which committed countless atrocities during the Sabbat Worlds Crusade. On the world of Balhaut, in the aftermath of the fighting, as the Imperial forces secured their occupation, the legacy of the Kith's murderous Magisters was revealed. Skara's murder-camps on the Balopolis Peninsula contained hideous evidence of the genocide the Kith had wrought on the population of Balhaut, perhaps for no other reason than the pursuit of their own twisted entertainment.Imperial personnel who witnessed these discoveries were plagued by terrible mental distress and even insanity. Still others, most notably Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt were driven on in a relentless obsession to destroy the perpetrators of these atrocities forever. Following his flight from Balhaut, Skara took refuge on Sapiencia, an Ocean World. Supported by his Kith followers the architect of the Balopolis murder-camps established a new stronghold from which to mount counterstrike operations at the Imperial bases on Voltemand and Caligula.After a single mass Astra Militarum assault in early 768.M41 reconquered Sapiencia, Skara's plans were swiftly brought to an end. The masterful orbital drop onto the beaches of the primary island groups would prove to be one of the Sabbat Worlds Crusade's swiftest victories, mostly due to the capture of the genocidal Magister early in the assault.The vile Kith destroyed themselves in a mass suicide ritual in accordance with their dark cult beliefs. Skara craved death himself, but was denied, as his murderous career finally ended when he was given over to the tender mercies of the Holy Ordos of the Inquisition. His fate remains unrevealed.
Chaos Cult - Krandor Cults: During the Krandor Rebellion in 795.M41 a massive uprising in the Krandor System is harshly put down by the Cadian 23rd Regiment. Several of the cults, notably the followers of the Shining Deity, the Cult of Many Tentacles, and the red-robed Brotherhood, had not been seen since the Fourth Quadrant Rebellion.Although both military and civilian losses are high, their quick subjugation is vital. The Imperium can ill-afford to lose the resource-rich Krandor system, which holds planets key to the whole of the Segmentum Obscurus.
Chaos Cult - The Lost and the Damned: The Lost and the Damned include the hordes of Chaos Cultists that follow Abaddon the Despoiler during the Black Crusades of Chaos Undivided. It is also in use as a more generic term for all of the human or mutant forces of Chaos that are not Chaos Space Marines.
Chaos Cult - The Magi: The Magi, the original philosophical descendants of one of the Inquisition's founders, Moriana, is a Chaos Cult that continuously seeks out possible Divine Avatars and either kill them, control them or study them according to their personal philosophy, only rather than wishing to suppress the God-Incarnate they want to bring it about. The God-Incarnate is the belief that a god could become a physical incarnation -- the physical vessel for a god in the material world.The idea of the God-Incarnate is that there will be a certain individual (or individuals) who will allow this to happen -- a god could invest their power into the mortal body and literally become a living god (commonly known amongst the Thorian faction of the Inquisition as Divine Avatars). Some of the Magi may be trying to create a God-Incarnate of the Chaos Gods, out of selfish hope to either be the Divine Avatar themselves, or by earning the eternal favour of their god for being the most loyal of servants. Others may be trying to reincarnate the Emperor, seeing this as the true way forward for Humanity.
Chaos Cult - Malice Brotherhood: The Malice Brotherhood was a Chaos Cult on the Mining World of Sepheris Secundus located in the Calixis Sector within the Golgenna Reach Sub-sector. The cult was formed when members of the serf class located a tome in the ruins of a mine tunnel, that had been used by a previous Chaos Cult that had been destroyed by the Inquisition. The massive tome described many of the rites and rituals associated with the extinct cult. The words in the book disturbed them greatly and they considered ridding themselves of it, but they were a desperate people; having long endured the brutal environment and hopeless existence that entails being a miner.The tome gave a few deluded souls the idea that the best way to escape their fate was to bring down the wrath of the Imperium, to purge the world of all life, and to put an end to their miserable fates and that of their families and friends. Having formed the Malice Brotherhood, they set out to cause enough trouble that the powers in the Imperium would come and purge the planet.Instead of a planetary-wide purge from orbit, a platoon of Astra Militarum troopers was sent to the planet in order to deal with the problem. The Commissar in charge considered the cult to be nothing but saboteurs and rabble-rousers and soon located the cult's base in the tunnels of the Gorgonid Mine. Making short work of the cultists on the surface the Imperial Guard forces pursued the fleeing cultists into the tunnels.It was there though that the tide of battle turned against the Guard and the cult as well. Deep inside the tunnels were the mutant servants of the Antithesis Stone -- a large lavender stone that gave off a pulsing pink glow and was able to change anyone near it into a mutant who then fell under its control. Sensing a chance to increase its power the Stone unleashed its mutant followers on the Guard and cult alike.What followed was a massacre as the mutants killed everything in their path. The Commissar had the tunnel sealed, leaving anyone inside to the mercy of the mutants. Those members of the cult that still lived were captured, along with the Guard, and changed into mutants that soon worshiped the Stone. Those members of the cult captured on the surface were executed by the Astra Militarum.
Chaos Cult - The Menagerie: Of all the threats facing the Ordo Malleus in the Calixis Sector, few are more dangerous, stranger, or as little understood as that posed by the cult known as the Menagerie. There are even those within the Inquisition that insist the cult is a phantom -- a paper threat, a thing without substance, a conjecture woven from half truths and overactive fear.This, in turn, has led to fears by some that even the Holy Ordos has not been beyond the cult's corrupting reach, and a few Daemonhunters have engaged in unsanctioned operations in order to destroy it. The horrific truth is far worse.The Menagerie is very real, and its threat goes far beyond that of a few hundred lost lives, or a thousand or a billion. It seeks to undermine the very nature of reality itself with its revelations and to pitch the Calixis Sector into an abyss of Chaos from which none shall escape. The Menagerie has such sights to show, and all are invited to come and see.
Chaos Cult - Mystic Path: The Mystic Path was a Chaos Cult comprised of a cartel of traders and noblemen who hailed from the planet Maginor, capital world of the Niaides Sub-sector in the Ultima Segmentum. Members of the Cult were known to utilise Warp artefacts to increase demand for their goods, a practice that gradually corrupted them over a long period of time.Almost two Terran centuries before his demise, Inquisitor Quixos encountered the Mystic Path. Rather than destroy them, as any other Inquisitor would have done, Quixos instead built up a relationship with them, so much so that they eventually became the personal cult of the Chaos-corrupted Inquisitor. The Path spread throughout the Ultima Segmentum and beyond, with Quixos as their patron.Two Inquisitors -- Helgrund first, and then Hetris Lugenbrau in 239.M41 -- arrived on Maginor and battled the Mystic Path, eventually coming into conflict with Quixos himself. Both times, however, the loyal Inquisitors were killed when the daemonblade wielded by Quixos caused them to immolate. The Mystic Path's last known activities with Quixos took place around the time of Quixos' eventual death on Farness Beta, in 343.M41.Aided by cultists of the Path, Quixos was attempting to duplicate the pylons of Cadia in an effort to collapse the Eye of Terror in on itself. Before he could complete this plan, however, Quixos was killed in single combat with Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn. The fate of the Mystic Path after this is unknown, but it is speculated that they were purged from Maginor by the Ordos Niaides shortly after Quixos' death.
Chaos Cult - The Pale Throng: Rightly regarded as the cause of one of the most dangerous threats to the stability of the Calixis Sector in recent years, the Pale Throng is a mutant cult whose origins lay on the bleak and oppressive world of Tranch. There it led the wave of bloody uprisings that ignited the infamous Tranch War, whose aftermath still lingers to plague many worlds in the Malfian and Adrantian sub-sectors to the present day.No subtle cult or hidden conspiracy, the Pale Throng is a crazed and degenerate congregation of shambling horrors and decayed and sickening witch–breeds guided by sinister mutant overlords. Its only goal is to throw off the shackles of its oppression and visit bloody vengeance in an apocalyptic rebellion to destroy the Imperium and ultimately seize control of the future of Mankind.Born on a world now made infamous for war and suffering, the Pale Throng has since created and inspired revolts on dozens of worlds across the Calixis Sector and beyond. But perhaps greater than the danger that this amorphous army of monstrosities possesses -- in terms of the threat to civil order -- is the fact that the Pale Throng and what it represents has become a blasphemous rallying cry for the twisted and disaffected. It has grown to become something of a heretical ideology that offers easy answers to the weak and feeds on the resentment and anger of the oppressed -- a rebellious whisper far harder to stamp out that any mere physical foe.
Chaos Cult - Penumbral Cult: The Penumbral Cult was a Chaos Cult that flourished on the verdant Agri-World of Sharlor. During a campaign carried out by the zealous Black Templars Chapter the Penumbral Cult was vanquished and its arch-heretic was executed in a public display and his profane works were burned. No sooner had the Heretic's head been hewn from his body than a Lord of Change tore its way out of his bleeding neck stump, shaking gore from its incandescent feathers.Taking to the sky, the daemon unleashed a maelstrom of psychic fire upon the Space Marines. Then, from out of the coiling smoke of the witchfire, a skyspear missile launched by the Hunter, Javelin of Faith, impaled the Greater Daemon, tearing it apart in an explosion that left only a shimmer of blue flame upon the wind.
Chaos Cult - Pilgrims of Hayte: An apocalyptic murder cult as insidious as it is cruel, the Pilgrims of Hayte have plagued the Calixis Sector for nearly three Terran centuries. During that time, they have risen to levels of infamy unrivalled by any other. Such is their well-founded reputation for horror and atrocity with the sector's powers that be that mere rumour of the cult's presence in a particular area is enough to generate near-panic among the nobility and prompt immediate, and brutal crackdowns by local authorities.The cult's ultimate goal is a simple one -- the destruction of the Imperium. More specifically, it is the tearing down of the Imperial faith and the slaying of all those who serve the God-Emperor -- one soul damned and one murder done at a time if need be. To this end, the cult seeks to twist and corrupt the minds of the unsuspecting, the downtrodden, and the weak of faith and to carry out acts of mass-murder and sow despair and terror on as a wide a scale as possible.The cult's masters, known as the False Prophets, wield the powers of the daemon and the baleful energies of the Warp with fearful abandon, driving on their coteries of madmen, lost souls, and hell-spawned monsters as living weapons in their unholy crusade to destroy the rule of the Golden Throne.
Chaos Cult - Pleasureseekers: The Pleasureseekers was a Slaaneshi Chaos Cult that took part in the conflict that engulfed the Pyrus Reach Sector sometime in the 41st Millennium.
Chaos Cult - Serpent Lodge: The Serpent Lodge was the name given to both a group of suspected Chaos Cultists and their Temple on the planet of Davin. The Lodge members treated the Warmaster Horus at the direction of the Word Bearers' Chaplain Erebus for the crippling injury he received campaigning on Davin's moon, and the Lodge itself is the location where Horus is believed to have begun his service to the Chaos Gods.
Chaos Cult - Shriven: The Shriven were once workers on the Forge World of Fortis Binary, however they were corrupted by the temptations of Chaos. They were described as elephantine, with long, nozzled gas masks sewn into their faces. They wore rubberised green body armour and the protective garb of their former workplace. Their armour was decorated with eye-aching runic symbols of Chaos.