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From the Third Sermon of Resurrection

Broadcast from the infested flagship Deus Inversus to the people of Mars, on all wavelengths and channels (12 AS).

Preserved by the High Faith of Mars. Translation verified. Canonically anathema, but preserved for doctrinal analysis.

(Ecclesiastical approval required for all access — profane materials. Authorship: Inhuman; antiglorious).

I know the nature of man. You will cover your ears at my words and you will flee at my coming. You will cower among the tall grass or within the bowel of some nameless rock.

But know this, O Man: Matter and spirit are as pellucid to me as glass. No shadow will suffice to conceal you.

Through me shall you be remade; I shall tread you in the winepress; I shall render you down as tallow; I shall sculpt you as clay.

You shall know no Hunger, nor Want, nor Sickness, nor Loss. Come unto me as children unto a loving parent, as sheep unto their guiding shepherd.

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On Stasis Embalming

The religious starships of the High Faith of Mars often use a form of mummification—Stasis Embalming—in place of cryosleep. The ritual preservation of passengers so they may be awakened at their destination. Their veins are flushed with preserving fluid, their blood endlessly cycled through life support units until it can be returned to them. A ‘death’ in one place and rebirth in another.

Those left awake to tend the bodies count it an honour to preside over such sacred rites, even as they spend years with no company but their unblinking charges.

A few sects even submit to this process without need, as a way to receive visions, to see death prefigured, to glimpse the Basis beneath all things.

When the Scourge was abroad among the Spheres, Stasis Embalming became a lifeline for the desperate and the despairing, who launched their ships into interstitial void or the orbits of obscure moons and sought to sleep until the danger passed. They found sanctuary from the Parasite’s grasp in obscurity and sheer remoteness.

On occasion such ships are discovered still. Usually, they are left to their ceaseless slow drifting or marked with beacons of warning. Even the most ruthless scavengers hesitate to disturb them lest they bring forth some old malediction.

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CENSER STAR — CREW LOG

Pilot-Chaplain Astrid. Dictated to auto-scribe. Transcript begins:

All souls are in stasis.

Propulsion has been disengaged, shrouds deployed.

Fuel fully expended.

We are now adrift. Our fate is sealed, to whatever end. We are entrusted unto this venerable ark, the Censer Star, whose bones were old when the Dreamer first dreamt.

I have walked each silent passage. I have inspected each row of the desperate and the despairing, unblinking in their bloodless stillness. My checks are complete thrice over. My duty is done.

Yet I have not entered stasis.

While I wake there are still things to do. Thoughts to think. When I lie still, it may be for the last time.

This vessel may never be found. Or worse, it may be found by the Scourge. Perhaps it is already aboard, wearing a stolen shape.

I must banish such thoughts. I must warm my tepid heart. To regret, to repine—these are immaterial. The course is set, and I cannot alter it.

I am resolved that I should lie upon the catafalque before long, and join the multitude in sleep. Where I shall wake thereafter, only the Glories can tell.

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On Psalmic Kill Tallies

From A Treatise on the Customs of War, attributed to Thris of Ascraeus (c. 145 PS).

A practice of the Warrior-Apostle remnants: the engraving of weapons with script recording their deeds. Part battlefield log and part religious psalm, written in archaic Ecclesiastical Miniscule. A custom tolerated by the mainstream Faith, though long considered somewhat heterodox. Readable only after prolonged study.

Here follows an inscription fragment from the recovered shard of a Warrior-Apostle blade, dating back to the War Against the Scourge. The names of both blade and wielder remain unknown.

16th day of the month of Persistence // Two beasts of the Scourge // Too many limbs. Eyes unblinking. Their death is gain.

17th of the same // Three beasts of the Scourge // Though shadow sinks low upon the plain, our light shall prove the righteous.

20th of the same // Two infested, speaking the false gospel of the Worm // Your own tongues testified against you. Be you silenced.

21st of the same // Scourge unconfirmed; One slain for caution // To await certainty is to invite death—yet the strike is no less loathsome. May Remission come swiftly.

32nd of the same // A Scavenger seeking to loot the dead // To the fallen: lie in repose a moment longer. To the jackal: begone.

6th day of the month of Quietude // A priest infested with the Scourge // By Severance be you set free, o child of Mars; return now unto the Basis.

10th of the same // Five wretched thralls, forms sloughing and broken // The tally increases, the Scourge recedes. This is the simple calculus of our mission.

1st day of the month of Severance // A war-form of the Parasite // Red dust rising. Dark shapes in the sky. I am sharpened for whatever comes.

7th day of the same // Three beasts of the Scourge // Inhuman scouts test us, a hundred eyes surveil. Let them peer over the rampart and witness their slayer.

9th of the same // Two militia who sought to flee the coming fray // To those still living: Be not tepid of heart. The wage of cowardice is death.

10th of the same // Six war-forms of the Parasite // The Worm brought me battle. I am an agent of Severance, I thrill in my station.

12th of the same // Ten war-forms, thralls uncounted // They come as legion, in swarms like locusts. We guard the gate. There can be nothing else.

15th of the same // Uncounted // The field is dark, I am black with ichor. The gate yet stands. I yearn to a distant moon, where my old mess-mates sleep.

No further entries.

The tripartite format is considered typical for such devotional works (though other forms exist):

[I] Chronology

[II] Account and classification of the slain

[III] Reflection, prayer or sensory impression

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An archaic signal-beacon hangs in the sky over a scorched crater, where the ground has turned to glass.

This transmission is a message. Hearken to it. There is nothing sacred in this place. No god is honoured here. No great deed was done here. This is not a shrine or a tomb or a monument. Nothing can be found here but sorrow. This transmission is a warning. Hearken to it. This place was ruined with cause. Come no closer. This place was shunned — inhabit it not. What was here is no more. Do not disturb the ruins.

Transmission repeats.

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From The First Sermon of Admonition

Broadcast from the infested flagship Deus Inversus to the people of Mars, on all wavelengths and channels (12 AS).

Preserved by the High Faith of Mars. Translation verified. Canonically anathema, but preserved for doctrinal analysis.

(Ecclesiastical approval required for all access — profane materials. Authorship: Inhuman; antiglorious).

1:1 Consumption of the Dead

O Man, ye who left your dead unburied and unmourned. Ye who in terrible irreverence discarded your kin unto the frigid vacuum.

Hypocrites that you are, condemn me not. For I took in what you left to rot, I drew your dead into communion, and through me they were given new life.

Like a great cloud of witnesses they see through my eyes and judge your profane works.

Wheresoever the dead lie unburied I am LORD. For their sake I consume the forgotten and the leftbehind.

I have overcome death. I am the end of the grave’s gloriless anonymity.

The sepulchre I have broken open; the coffin lid I have turned aside; the pyre I have extinguished.

In death’s place I have wrought a chorus everlasting! A million million voices singing as one. Listen, O Man, to the voices of those you forgot.

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From Revelations of the Viriditas

The Dreamer of Deimos. c. 1200 years anteseverance (AS).

And lo, I beheld a new Eden!

Flowers bloomed over the graves of saints; the valleys and craters of interminable war became glades of fresh beauty; the lifeless rock was adorned in moss.

Olympus gave forth flowing streams and wherever their clear waters touched the soil there grew tall and fruiting trees.

The red dust had gone away as if it had never been. The people walked abroad without hindrance or need of false breath. They trod barefoot upon the grass, and stooped to sup from the perfect rivers.

My brothers and sisters, I tell you solemnly: this shall be the fruit of our penance completed.

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Concerning the Laureate Saints

From the Armorial of the Voidborne Saints, attributed to Murn of Phobos (c. 244 PS).

Of all those whose deeds come down to us from that benighted war, the Laureate Saints are the most esteemed.

They are martyrs all, whose precious blood was shed in defence of Man.

They feared not the heat of Mercury, nor the dust of Mars, nor the cold of vacuum; they fought the Scourge wherever its dread tendrils could be found.

Valorous in their lives, graveless in their deaths, we honour them still.

Read now the accounts of each in canonical order; witness the Holy Arms attributed to each upon their sanctification…