Marduk - Dark Crusade: Having uncovered the means of the inner working of the Nexus Arrangement with the help of the Daemon-possessed Magos Darioq-Grendh'al, Marduk tested the artefact on the doomed planet of Palantyr V.Satisfied that the device produced the expected effect, as his first act as a Dark Apostle, Marduk was charged by the Dark Council to lead a Dark Crusade into the vital Imperial sub-sector known as the Boros Gate, a protectorate system of the White Consuls Space Marines, a Successor Chapter of the hated Ultramarines.The Word Bearers would be entering one of the Imperium's best defended regions of space, for only the Cadian Gate was more fiercely guarded. The system's defences were formidable, protected by a vast Imperial fleet and the largest space station within the Segmentum Obscurus. The devastatingly powerful space bastion that orbited system's capital planet of Boros Prime was a relic of the Dark Age of Technology.Known as a Kronos Star Fort, it possessed enough firepower to destroy half the Word Bearers' crusade. But the true strength of this system's nigh-impenetrable defences lay in its ability to rapidly receive reinforcements from across the galaxy within solar hours as a result of the wormholes that existed within it.These unusual, natural space-time anomalies were the sole reason Boros Gate was so hotly defended by the servants of the Corpse Emperor and so jealously regarded by the Traitor Legions that had been loyal to Horus.Even for the Legions dedicated to Chaos, the Warp-routes through the Immaterium were often convoluted and difficult to navigate. Thousands of overlapping routes existed through the Warp, twisting and turning in constant flux. There were fast moving streams that wound their way through the Immaterium, allowing remarkably swift passage from one area of realspace to another, but also stagnant areas of null-time where a fleet could become becalmed for standard years or decades at a time.However, there were some rare Warp-routes that remained stable and unchanging through all the passing centuries and millennia. Highly prized, and violently defended at their egress points, the most favoured of these stable wormholes allowed entire fleets to be shifted from warzone to warzone almost instantaneously, utilising these routes like mass transit highways that bridged the gaps between distant sub-sectors.The Imperial system that the Dark Crusade was soon to descend upon was the hub of one such cluster of wormholes. If the Word Bearers managed to secure this system and take control of this transportation hub, it would provide them a waypoint that allowed nearly instantaneous travel over thousands of light years between almost two dozen other systems. One such location was only a relatively short jump from Terra, the birthplace of Mankind and the sacred capital of the Imperium itself.The Boros Gate was to be the staging ground of the End Times, according to the Word Bearers prophecy known as the Rubric Apocalyptica. Marduk and his fellow Dark Apostles were to be the heralds and harbingers of the prophesied End Times of the Imperium when Chaos would finally triumph over all.The Boros Gate was to be the staging ground for the fall of the Imperium. For ten thousand Terran years the forces of Chaos had tried to take this system, and for ten thousand years they had been denied. Several Word Bearers Dark Crusades had tried to gain control of the region, but none had ever returned.In all, seventeen Hosts of the XVIIth Legion had been thrown against this system over the millennia and all had been wiped out. The Black Legion had lost double that number of Heretic Astartes trying to find a way around the heavily guarded Cadian Gate. Other Traitor Legions had suffered when attempting to strike at the region, most notably the Death Guard of Mortarion and the Iron Warriors of Perturabo.To go against this region was not merely to go against one system's defences and its Astartes guardians, but rather to go against the fleet of an entire sub-sector. It was to go against the entire force of the Astartes Praeses, the order of Space Marine Chapters that permanently patrolled the flanks of the Eye of Terror, ever vigilant for incursions from within.Utilising the wormholes of this region, the Astartes Praeses were a thorn in the side of the Traitor Legions, able to quickly manoeuvre their companies to wherever they were needed. However, Marduk had presented the Dark Council with the means to accomplish their grandiose objective; the Necron artefact known as the Nexus Arrangement.The Warmaster Abaddon himself would be watching the Word Bearers' progress closely. He had already sent envoys to gather support, scouring the Eye and the Maelstrom for all those Renegades who would fight under his banner.Rivalries and blood feuds were being put aside, for all could feel that the End Times drew nigh. The Word Bearers' triumph at the Boros Gate would herald the last of the Despoiler's Black Crusades, the 13th Black Crusade of ca. 999.M41. Because of Marduk and his fellow Dark Apostles, the heavens would burn and the Imperium of Man would be dust.