#but to some extent those three were all fallen/corrupted heroes who lived too long

[wild-moss-art]

I think it’s interesting how the main protagonist deaths in rwby have all been framed as a personal choice. Cinder tells pyrrha not to follow her, penny asks jaune, and now ruby drinks the tea. Now I definitely have thoughts on that stuff but right now I want to talk about the choice to die versus the choice to live.

All our “good guys” choose to die for the cause, or choose to die because the cause is hopeless. While the main antagonist, salem, specifically does NOT choose death and her story is about her defiance of death. Death is framed as not necessarily a good thing, but a thing that happens to good people. Jaune lived long enough to see himself become the villain, mirroring Salem’s story. Summer hasn’t died, which is framed as worse than if she had.

Then there is the theme of rebirth. Rebirth is framed as a bad thing, a sort of torture, an inability to escape the inevitability of death in any of your lives. Ozpin is not coping. Penny was brought back to life, and then brought back again, and it was all futile because in the end she still chose to die. Alyx used the tree’s rebirth to sacrifice(?) her brother.

Ultimately, ruby will be reborn in the tree, which I can only conclude is going to be a catastrophically bad thing. She will not use this rebirth to let go of her sorrows and instead will be shaped by them, becoming something worse. Maybe wby will have to fight her. I don’t know.

[injanery]

A beginner's guide to Romance of the Three Kingdoms

Romance of the Three Kingdoms is among the most widely-read and influential novels in the world, bringing together centuries of accumulated folk tales and popular elaborations relating to the Three Kingdoms period in ancient China (220-280 AD). The amalgamated version we read today is usually attributed to the fourteenth-century playwright Lo Kuan-Chung. Later editions added to this work, however, and by the seventeenth century the most widely-circulated version had acquired the immortal opening line: 'Empires wax and wane; states cleave asunder and coalesce.'

Partly because the book relates to such an omnipresent phenomenon as the rise and fall of states, it continues to capture imaginations on a global scale. Chinese and Japanese culture has drawn heavily on the themes and lessons of the Three Kingdoms in poetry, artwork, theatre, literature, and politics. In China, the novel has been adapted into multiple serialised television programmes, as well as a string of blockbuster films. Japan has developed many video games based on the book, and the British studio Creative Assembly also released their own Three Kingdoms strategy game.

For the casual reader, however, the book can present a bewildering challenge. The most popular English edition tops out at 1,360 pages, despite being heavily abridged. Following all the countless narrative threads from start to finish requires multiple readings, especially as some of them seem insignificant at first. The reader is also given a dizzying list of names to memorise, including geographical locations and, for individuals, as many as three different names which may be used interchangeably. The writing style is also not what most Western readers will be accustomed to: for example, detailed descriptive passages are used sparingly, and much of the scenery is not described at all. It is a shame for this remarkable story to go under-appreciated for such superficial reasons, but it does require some demystification. So what, exactly, is the book all about, and why does it still matter so much?

***

Until the end of the Qing dynasty in 1912, China was ruled by a millennia-long succession of imperial families. The history of the country is usually split into chunks named after the dynasty ruling at the time, such as the Zhou (1050-256 BC), the Han (206 BC-220 AD), and the Tang (618-906 AD). Each dynasty ascended to power after a period of upheaval and civil war, and ended in the same fashion after descending into weakness, corruption, and inefficiency. This process gave rise to a sense of inevitability and a feeling that all regimes have a limited lifespan—hence the inclusion of the line 'Empires wax and wane' in the edition that was circulated shortly after the fall of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644 AD).

The events of Romance of the Three Kingdoms take place during and after the demise the Han dynasty, which succeeded the short-lived Qin dynasty (221-206 BC) and before that the Zhou. The influence of Confucianism, a deeply hierarchical, patriarchal, and ritualised philosophy of social order formulated in the time of the late Zhou dynasty, can be felt throughout the Romance. Women, for instance, only become key actors when they are used as pawns to seduce enemies and destabilise states, or when they attempt to meddle in politics and thereby doom their own cause. All main characters have a deeply hierarchical view of the world, and among their followers, loyalty and sacrifice are the most prominent virtues. Nowhere are this themes more visible than in the opening chapters.

Readers are presented with a Han state that, through decades of misrule, has fallen into chaos. Instead of listening to learned advisers, recent emperors have let power fall into the hands of a group of eunuchs, leading the Heavens to inflict natural disasters and supernatural events upon China, and a visitation by a 'monstrous black serpent' upon the emperor. This sets the tone of the whole story: real events interspersed with fantastical elaborations and dramatised innovations.

We hear from one of the emperor's ministers, who informs him that the recent happenings were 'brought about by feminine interference in State affairs'. The social order has been neglected, leading to a general decay in the moral standing of state and country. Into this power vacuum comes a popular rebellion inspired by a mystical movement: the Yellow Turbans. The causes, composition, and objectives of the rebellion are left unexplored, and for the authors these details are inconsequential anyway—it merely serves as a narrative tool to demonstrate the extent of government weakness and set the scene for the introduction of the tale's central heroes.

The Han government puts out a call to arms to defeat the Yellow turbans, and among those to answer the call is Liu Bei, a shoemaker who claims descent from the Han royal line and, together with his sworn warrior-brothers Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, goes on to found the Shu-Han state in south-western China—one of the Three Kingdoms. Liu Bei is the character with whom the authors seem to sympathise most, being portrayed as an empathetic and just ruler who surrounds himself with able advisers and noble warriors. His virtue, however, often becomes a detriment when competing with less scrupulous opponents.

Another to answer the call was Ts'ao Ts'ao, later the founder of the kingdom of Wei in northern China and an altogether more ruthless, cunning, and suspicious character. Although he takes on a villainous aura at times, his state would prove to be the base from which a new dynasty was ultimately founded.

The Yellow Turban rebellion is successfully defeated by this coalition, and the eunuchs too are deposed from their over-powerful position in the royal court. Into the power vacuum, however, comes another menace, Dong Zhuo—gluttonous, cruel, barbaric—who seizes possession of the young emperor Xian and therefore the levers of power. Another coalition of regional warlords, including Liu Bei and Ts'ao Ts'ao, is formed to challenge Dong, and at this point we meet the family behind the third of the Three Kingdoms—Sun Jian and his sons, Ce and Quan. Their kingdom would be called Wu, based south of the Yangtze river.

The coalition against Dong eventually breaks apart and fails, and he is instead killed by his own general when members of his court hatch a plot to involve the two of them in a love triangle. With Dong gone, China once again descends into a violent power-struggle. The list of petty regional lords and pretenders to the throne is gradually whittled down until there remains a triumvirate of challengers—Liu Bei's Shu-Han, Ts'ao Ts'ao's Wei, and Wu under the Sun family. What follows is an epic, winding tale of political and military intrigue, plots, assassinations, battles of wit, moral dilemmas, and an ever-changing web of alliances and loyalties. Each kingdom has its moments of triumph and disaster, and their rulers all declare themselves to be the sole legitimate emperor.

***

There are perhaps four key moments that define the direction of the story following the founding of the Three Kingdoms. The first is the Battle of Red Cliffs (208 AD), fought on the Yangtze river between an alliance of Liu Bei and Sun Quan and the vastly more numerous invading forces of Ts'ao Ts'ao. Liu’s strategist, the legendary Zhuge Liang, prays for a favourable wind, enabling the allies to launch a daring fire attack and burn the Wei navy. This victory halts Ts'ao's momentum, but Shu and Wu eventually fall out over territorial disputes, and one of Sun Quan's generals later kills Liu Bei's beloved brother, Guan Yu.

Liu's rage at the death of his brother prompts him, against the advice of his followers, to invade Wu. The result, the Battle of Xiaoting (222 AD), is the second key turning point in the story. Wu's forces again deploy fire tactics to destroy the invading army, and the defeated Liu retreats to coalesce and focus his efforts against the more expansive kingdom of Wei.

From 228 to 234 AD, the unmatched Shu strategist Zhuge Liang leads a series of northern expeditions against Wei, and these campaigns comprise the third turning point. Although Zhuge uses his superhuman strategic abilities to achieve some remarkable results on the battlefield, none of his expeditions inflict a decisive blow, partly because Wei had by this time found its own talismanic strategist in Sima Yi. A long rivalry ensues between these two great minds, and while Zhuge is portrayed as having the edge, he is always foiled at the last moment by natural causes or by political failures in Shu following the death of Liu Bei. Zhuge's own demise then removes the greatest external threat to Wei's dominance.

Another key player to have passed away by this point is Ts'ao Ts'ao. Like the Han state before it, the kingdom of Wei was now in the hands of far less capable figures than its founder, leaving the way clear for the final key moment in the tale: Sima Yi's coup against Ts'ao Shuang and his seizure of power in Wei (249 AD). Sima's descendants go on to conquer Shu-Han (263 AD), declare their own dynasty (the Jin, 266-420 AD), and finally conquer Wu (280 AD).

And so it was that none of the Three Kingdoms survived to unify China. All of them ultimately became microcosms of the same dysfunction and decay that afflicted late Han, and they suffered the same end. This is the great irony of the Romance. However, it also helps to explain the enduring popularity of this tale, for it concerns not just the fortunes of states, but something much more intimate—the apparent powerlessness of human effort when stacked against the will of the Heavens and the crushing inevitability of fate. As the book's concluding poem states:

All down the ages rings the note of change, For fate so rules it; none escape its sway. The kingdoms three have vanished as a dream, The useless misery is ours to grieve.

[roguexunited]

Wtf Star Wars: The Last Jedi, W.T.F.

“Wtf Star Wars: The Last Jedi, W.T.F.”

DON’T READ THIS IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE, IT CONTAINS SPOILERS.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Just coming out of the movie theater I still find myself with a sense of discontent after watching the newest installment of the Star Wars saga. Unfortunately for the franchise, Episodes I-III made me jaded about the whole affair, and I came to expect very little out of it, just with the exception of Rogue One, which till this day I think is the best the franchise has to offer, but more on that later. After the fiasco of the last one ― which was a carbon copy of Episode I, which itself is a carbon copy of Episode IV ― I was not expecting the story to deviate that much from the jewel that is The Empire Strikes Back, nonetheless, I found a very different Star Wars than what I expecting.

           Different is good, it means that we are not getting dealt the same story over and over again and that the writers and producers understand that times have changed. In particular, I think that stories, even Disney stories, have come to understand that even though there is good and evil nothing is as black and white; Zootopia, Moana, and Brave have been some of the examples in which this dichotomy has been challenged and questioned, bringing forth a richer plot. Kudos for Star Wars for realizing that times have changed, but the execution of set change was deplorable, especially coming from a cinematic universe which foundation is precisely this dichotomy, light vs dark, good vs evil. Making the plot askew from this preset would have shifted the entire basis of the Jedi/Sith relationship, and shaken the galaxy as we know it. They tried, they really tried, most of the movie is trying but not doing anything to achieve change, falling Yoda's teachings in every step.

           Let’s begin with the First Order and the dark side. What is up with that? It is understandable that, after one faction has taken out the opposition, the mentality and remnants of the fallen government doesn't just simply disappear, but apparently they didn’t disappear at all but thrived, grew and overtook this new Republic in record time. How? We don’t know. Why? We don’t know either. Mimicking A New Hope, where the story beings a medias res (literally as it is Episode IV), The Last Jedi takes off fighting a force which is not really explained, they are simply the bad guys. There is a rebellion, which should actually be the ruling government, but if it is seen as trying to silence the voices of the opposition then it becomes a new empire. So all the heroes we love needed to be forced into playing the role of the underdog once again. The First Order, with its religious and programed fanaticism, is unexplained and uncontested at the moment. At least, through the second trilogy (Episodes I-III) we so the rise the empire, explained through a political intrigued that showed that the battlefront had two fields: the political one, that was never the Jedi’s strong point, and the actual war, which was just a diversion to take over the Senate. In that regard, the second trilogy was very intelligent in paving the way for the original trilogy. Now, after two trilogies it is ludicrous that they present a villain in such an old fashion way. This is a nod to the original foundation of the Star Wars universe, the First Order represents darkness, and darkness rises from nowhere.

           I also find it hard to believe that history is just that, old tales that don’t mean anything. Having heroes who fought in the original war are still alive and well (although in some cases dying), it is unbelievable that they didn’t see the signs and tried to put a stop to this whole dark side shenanigan. But yet again, they can’t be seen as the oppressors, so once more they are driven to become rebels, repeating the same hubris as the Jedi Knights before them, and so hope can only rise when the safety of the universe is in peril and when the good guys are backed up into a corner.

           Now the same thing happens to Kylo Ren as a villain, just like Darth Vader before him, he was really no backstory, just that he is the son of two of the most beloved characters of the saga, but that for some reason he was corrupted. Unlike Vader, who we had to wait years until the second trilogy to find out the hows and whys of his downfall (which made The Revenge of the Sith tragic but necessary) I doubt Kylo Ren is going to get Episodes VII.I to VII.III to endear him to the audience just to break our hearts with his turn from the light. All we are left with is with some small insights to his character from a very detached set of parents and uncle, leaving Kylo quite un-humanized in that regard. With Rey, we see how they somewhat mirror each other, playing with the idea of the Ying and the Yang, but still a connection that at this moment seems forced and superficial. His struggle is mostly internal, we kind of see hints of grey, or at least Rey helps us point out those hints, but in the end, even when the writers tried to drag Star Wars kicking and screaming into a storyline that questions who are the good guys and who are the bad guys, they just couldn’t shake off the foundation of their universe, and so most of the movie is pointless in that regard, which is one of the reasons this rant was spurred into life.

           Then we have General Hux, who is a cartoon villain with blind ambition, a short temper and a fragile male ego. I really don’t have much to say about him. He’s just there. Serving as an example of why this First Order needs to be taken down, sometimes as comedic relief, but mostly his just there fulfilling his role in this universe of unshakable black and white presets.

           And where Oh! where do these almighty Sith Lords keep sprouting out of? This is a question that has been baffling me for years. Where? How? There was just supposed to be two, a master and an apprentice, yet they have been lying to the Jedi for centuries now because clearly there are more than two. If the Jedi would just admit that fact, then they wouldn’t be so surprised every time a Sith Lord takes over and darkness rules the galaxy. They should learn to be always on high alert because those guys are like cockroaches, they are the proverbial hydra that is invisible and will never be truly dead. But now, they are taken by surprise every time. Well, no, they were not taken by surprise, Luke knew, but what did he decide to do with the knowledge? Hide, that’s what he did.

           Now to the good guys, The Republic/ The Rebellion. As mentioned before, they forced the characters back to the place where we found them back in the 70´s, fighting from the trenches (literally this time), the underdog, the last beacon of hope, and it’s starting to get old. How stupid can they be to let this happen a second time, after those poor folks in Rogue One gave their all to bring Leia hope, and the put everything into action! I am upset in their behalf. One would think it might take at least two or three generations to shift the balance of power, not just a couple of years. I guess what they are trying to achieve if to show that armed rebellions are not rewarded with steady long lasting governments, and then suddenly Star Wars gets too real.

           Rey, Finn, and Poe. They are okay, but just okay guys. I mean, Rey is struggling with both light and darkness within herself, but just like Kylo’s struggle it is just a fleeting moment and ends up being superficial. Finn, was heroic the previous movie as they used him to show us that, against all odds, Stormtroopers can think outside the box! Who knew? His struggle, I think is the one that questions the dichotomy in the best way, as it shows how good and evil blur in the world beyond an individual, and how their balance affects the whole world. It is through this former Stormtrooper’s eyes that we begin to see beyond the Skywalker horizon. Let’s stick to it, let’s see where it takes us. And so all we have left is Poe, AKA, reckless, trigger-happy, stock hero that is just coming to understand those heroics have a human cost. Hurray for character growth (this is sarcasm by the way)!

           Now, unfortunately, I am comparing The Last Jedi to Rogue One, which, in the blink of an eye, became my favorite Star Wars movie, right along with The Empire Strikes Back. In its core, Rogue One showed us the human side to both the Rebellion and the Empire. In the span of a movie, we were introduced to complex characters that were not black and white, but that stuck to their belief, even for a brief moment, which translates into knightly honor and another building block of the Star Wars universe. Their struggle was plagued with character flaws from both sides, we saw hesitation from members of the Empire as the pulled the trigger of the Death Star, we saw Bodhi and Galen Erso, who showed as the reluctance of some members of the Empire and that some had a choice and decided to do something about it, now Finn joins their ranks. We also so Cassian who was not a boy scout and who struggled with the difficult decisions being at war brought him to. We also witnessed that not everyone in the Rebellion’s command was completely trustworthy and good. All in all, we saw Star Wars done well. And now this. THIS.

           The Rebels we found in Rogue One ― whose flaws made them endearing and, to me, even more heroic ― ��are lost, all that’s left is the carcass of a rebellion that has lost its light and pins all of its hope on Carrie Fisher, who we literally have lost. I understand why Leia is the beacon of hope, she is the lady of light that has guided the Star Wars universe since the beginning. But now that we have lost Fisher in live all I have to look forward to is a CGI Leia, which breaks my heart, the technology hasn’t been developed to the extent Sim0ne promised. Now, with that beacon of light dwindling, we no longer have a general to guide the way. Rogue One was powerful, their suicide mission to give it all in the name of the Rebellion was pure perfection, but Leia’s appearance at the end just sealed the deal and made it greater. Now all is gone, and we have to wait and see how they will solve this problem now that they literally placed all their eggs in the Leia basket.  

           Now, to the grey areas. The only character that showed an inch of complexity, perhaps a little more profound than questioning of a couple of beats, was DJ as he was the only one that understood that things are not just black and white, but he is despicable because he has no true honor, or so we’ll see. As I said before, knightly honor is another building block in the Star Wars universe, and because he has none, his teachings will go unheeded until he either chooses a side or dies a horrible death, will just have to wait and see.  

           Finally, I’ll write about my pet peeve. There was an astounding lack of decorum in this movie, and some of the jokes (most of them actually), were lame, VERY lame. In past movies, we’ve seen that the comedic relief is up to the droids and the non-humans, and in some cases the heroes, but this time the jokes, to my perception, were very poorly timed. Yes, Luke Skywalker I’m talking about you, you know what you’ve done! I miss the days when Jedi masters were either true knightly gentlemen or completely batshit crazy, but not something in between. Luke, “You are the celery of desserts, be ice cream or be nothing.”

           I will not delve into the rest of what caused me pain about this movie. Although, as my friend WiseCube pointed out, the amount of Pokemon was astounding now that they’ve discovered CG, but that is a rant for another day. All that is left to say is that if Rogue One hadn’t come along this rant would be much shorter and probably more private, what that movie showed me was that there are possibilities for the Star Wars universe, possibilities that can be executed well when their goals are well scripted. And so now, the rest of the saga needs to step up, no more slacking!

[asktheadeptus]

Roboute Guilliman

"The warrior who acts out of honour cannot fail. His duty is honour itself. Even his death - if it is honourable - is a reward and can be no failure, for it has come through duty. Seek honour as you act, therefore, and you will know no fear."— Primarch Roboute Guilliman

Roboute Guilliman, sometimes referred to as the Avenging Son, The Victorious, The Master of Ultramar and The Blade of Unity, is the Primarch of the Ultramarines Space Marine Legion and its myriad subsequent Second Founding Successor Chapters. Held by some as a paragon among the Emperor's sons, Roboute Guilliman was as much a patrician statesman as he was an indefatigable warrior. A being of preternatural intelligence, cold reason and indomitable will, Guilliman forged his Legion into a vast force of conquest and control, a weapon by which he made himself the master of a domain, the Realms of Ultramar, which spanned five hundred worlds. Guilliman is the Primarch who single-handedly reshaped the Imperium of Man after the Horus Heresy during the Reformation, taking the lead role in reforming the administrative and military apparatus of the Imperium following the internment of the Emperor of Mankind within the Golden Throne on Terra. Guilliman is perhaps best remembered for being the author of the Codex Astartes, a key volume that laid out the proper tactics and military organisation for the majority of Loyalist Space Marine Chapters now in existence. Roboute Guilliman is also one of the few Loyalist Primarchs still alive. Following the Horus Heresy, Guilliman and his Ultramarines met the Emperor's Children Traitor Legion and the Daemon Primarch Fulgrim upon the field of battle where Guilliman was poisoned by a wound to his neck made by his traitorous fellow Primarch's Chaos-tainted blades. The Primarch was put into temporal stasis on the verge of death and his body was placed upon the throne that lies in the Temple of Correction on the Ultramarines' homeworld of Macragge. Many pilgrims of the Imperial Cult travel across the galaxy every year to visit the temple and see the body of a Primarch, a blessed son of the God-Emperor himself. Some pilgrims claim that the grievous wound is slowly healing, though such an action should be physically impossible within an activated stasis field. Yet some believe that the Imperium and Mankind are entering the End Times and that the Emperor is using his divine will to enact a miracle and resurrect his son to serve as Mankind's champion in its most desperate hour.

History

The Son of Macragge

Thanks to the widely distributed efforts of numerous Imperial Iterators, the story of the Primarch Roboute Guilliman, his early life and his finding is widely known and well accounted for, in stark contrast to certain others of the Primarchs. Much of these accounts have of course served the role of edification for the masses and the demands of propaganda, but between the accounts, variously embellished, a number of consistent facts and themes emerge. According to Imperial legend, the Emperor of Mankind created the Primarchs from artificially-engineered genes using his own genome as a template, carefully imbuing each of them with unique superhuman powers. Imperial doctrine goes on to tell how the Ruinous Powers of Chaos spirited away the Primarchs within their gestation capsules, scattering them widely across the galaxy through the Warp. More than one of the capsules was breached whilst it drifted through Warpspace - the forces of the Immaterium leaked in, wreaking havoc on the gestating being inside the capsule. Undoubtedly damage was done and Chaotic corruption affected several of the Primarchs, although the nature of that corruption would not become apparent until the Horus Heresy.

After drifting for decades, or in some cases even hundreds of years, the twenty gestation capsules came to rest on human-settled worlds throughout the Milky Way Galaxy - distant planets inhabited by a variety of human cultures, and whether by fickle fate or cruel design, each world would provide a crucible which would temper the child into the Primarch they would become, be that hero or monster, tyrant or liberator. The capsule containing the developing form of one Primarch fell upon the world of Macragge in the Eastern Fringe of the galaxy. Macragge was a bleak but no inhospitable world, part of a decayed star empire of ages past that Mankind had inhabited for many centuries since the time of the Dark Age of Technology. Its industries had survived intact, and its people had retained an authoritarian but cohesive society. It had remarkably preserved a number of antiquated short range Warp-capable craft which could be utilized for near-stellar transit -- conditions permitting -- and its people continued to build sub-light spacecraft even during the time of the most intense Warp Storms. This had allowed the people of Macragge to maintain contact with several neighboring human-settled star systems, despite the storms' fury, and so retain a tenuous link to the rest of human space and the knowledge that it was not alone in the darkness.

So it was that when the Primarch's fallen capsule was discovered by a group of magnates who were on a hunt in a local forest, they knew it immediately for a device of advanced technology rather than a thing of superstition and magic. The magnates broke the capsule's seal and discovered a strikingly beautiful and perfectly formed child within it who was surrounded by a glowing nimbus of power. The child was brought before Konor Guilliman, one of a pair of nobles who bore the title "consul", whose authority governed the most civilized and powerful region of Macragge, and Konor adopted the infant as his own son in a manner not uncommon to his culture, naming him Roboute.

The young Primarch grew unnaturally quickly and as he did so, his unique physical and mental powers became obvious to all. It is recorded that by the time of his tenth birthday, Guilliman had mastered everything the wisest tutors of Macragge could teach him. His insight into matters of history, philosophy and science astonished his teachers, while his recall was absolute and his ability to extrapolate accurate conclusions from fragmentary information was said to border on the inexplicable. His greatest talent, however, lay in the art of war, which was itself treated as a high and lauded science in Macragge's culture. As soon as he had attended his legal majority, Roboute's foster-father Konor immediately granted him command over an expeditionary force sent to pacify the far northern lands of Macragge. Named Illyrium, it was a barbarous land of outcasts and petty, warring micro-states that had long harboured brigands and mercenaries who raided more civilised lands as often as they hired themselves as foot soldiers to fight their neighbors' wars. Roboute fought a brilliant campaign and won both the submission and the respect of the fierce Illyrium warrior bands, but when he returned to his home from the northern frontier, Roboute found the capital of Macragge Civitas in turmoil.

The Death of Konor

During Robout's absence, Konor Guilliman's co-consul, a man name Gallan, had unleashed a coup d'etat against Konor -- a development far from unknown historically, if in this instance a surprise. Gallan, it transpired, had long harboured designs on undiluted rulership and had conspired with those amongst the wealthy nobility of Macragge who were jealous of Konor's political power and popularity, and also increasingly afraid of his preternaturally precocious foster child's future. These malcontents represented Macragge's ancient regime, an aristocracy whose wealth was manifested by vast estates which were supported by the toiling of a multitude of impoverished vassals. Konor, backed by Macragge's industrial magnates -- rivals to the old regime -- had moved to challenge this balance of power, forcing the aristocracy of Macragge to provide their vassals with increased living standards and rights before the law, weakening the aristocracy's stranglehold on the polity. Konor had also passed legislation that obliged the nobility of Macragge to begin an ambitious program of improving the long neglected infrastructure of their nation and enlarging the capital city at their own expense. These reforms made Konor Guilliman all but unassailable in the common people's eyes, but were highly unpopular among all but a few of the more far-sighted aristocrats.

As Roboute Guilliman and his triumphant army approached the city of Macragge Civitas, they saw the smoke form a multitude of fires and encountered citizens fleeing from the city in anarchy, and Roboute learned that Gallan's private army had attacked the senate house while Konor and his loyal bodyguard troops had been inside. The refugees each told the same story; that rebel soldiers had attacked the senate, whilst a drunken mob, instigated by Gallan but now out of anybody's control, roamed the city burning, looting and murdering. Roboute hurried to his foster father's rescue. Leaving his own troops to deal with the drunken rioters without quarter, Roboute personally fought his way towards the center of the city, passing the bloody work of rebel firing squads everywhere in the government district, but at the senate house, found himself too late. All was a bullet-ridden and blasted ruin, and even the rebels it seemed had fled the scene to join the looting. There, in the half-collapsed shelters beneath the building, he found his father dying. For three days the wounded Counsul had directed the defense of the besieged senate house, even as surgeons fought for his life following a botched assassination attempt on the senate floor which had touched off the conspiracy's chaotic attack. It is apocryphally said that as he gasped out his last breath, Konor detailed the extent of Gallan's betrayal to his beloved foster son and named those whose hands were stained with his blood.

Roboute Guilliman's cold rage at his foster father's death was unstoppable. With the full backing of his army and the beleaguered citizens of Macragge Civitas, Roboute crushed the aristocratic rebels, scattering their hireling armies and lined the streets with the hanging bodies of the rioters, thereby quickly restoring order to the capital city and the surrounding lands. Thousands of citizens flocked to the senate house and amidst a wave of popular acclaim, Roboute assumed the mantle of the sole and now all-powerful Consul of Macragge. The new ruler broke the old, aristocratic order and stripped from them their lands and titles. Gallan and his fellow conspirators were seized, the ring leaders publicly executed and the rest sentenced to hard labor rebuilding the city they had ruined, stone by stone, by hand. It was not a sentence they would long survive. In the new order, loyal soldiers and hardworking settlers were granted rights where the oppressive aristocracy had once held sway. With super-human energy and the singularity of vision only a Primarch was capable of executing, the new Consul reorganized the social order of Macragge, creating a ruthlessly enforced meritocracy where the hardworking prospered and the honourable received positions of high office, and those who shirked the law or worked against the good of the whole faced draconian, but faultlessly even-handed punishment. The stagnated and uneven economy was re-ordered, technology disseminated rather than horded by the elite, and the armed forces were transformed into a powerful and well-equipped force. Macragge flourished as never before -- one people and one order, united under the people and one order, united under the unchallengeable rule of Roboute Guilliman.

Ultramar

Around the time that the young Roboute Guilliman waged war in Illyria, the Emperor's fleet had reached the planet of Espandor at the outer edge of the network of worlds with which Macragge had maintained tenebrous contact. From the Espandorians the Emperor learned of the existence of Macragge and the extraordinary son of the Consul Konor Guilliman, and from what he learned he knew that this child could be none other than a missing Primarch. There have been some who have suggested that the Emperor's arrival at Espandor and the isolated region so far from the front line of the Great Crusade's main spur of progress was no accident, and that by some arts He had perceived or had foreknowledge of what He would find. Regardless, what followed was certainly not foreseen. As the Emperor's fleet quickly moved on to Macragge, it was almost immediately deflected by violent warp squalls which had risen up to separate Macragge and a handful of nearby systems from approach. Thwarted by a power even the Emperor could not readily ignore, it would be something in the region of five standard years before contact could be successfully attempted.

In the years that intervened, Macragge had undergone a striking transformation. It was now a world of uniformity and order, prosperous and productive. Its cities had been rebuilt in glittering marble and shining steel, and the serried ranks of its armies were well armed and well equipped, and outfitting themselves now for operations beyond their own world. For even before the Emperor's arrival, Roboute Guilliman, it is said, had dwelt much on the ancient histories contained from his world's deposed aristocracy, and the fragments he found there telling of the ancient domains of Mankind, and he had begun to dream of new horizons and new worlds to conquer, of a domain "beyond the seas of night" or to use the ancient scholarly form found in the text -- "Ultramar". By his will, he made it so and within their warp-sealed enclave, vessels from Macragge now plied regular and well-patrolled trade routes with local star systems, bringing raw materials and people to the flourishing world, while against some of its neighbors, short, victorious conflicts had already been waged to pacify the strife they had found there. It is said that when the Emperor saw what his lost son had wrought, He was indeed pleased, and that he met with Roboute Guilliman without the dissembling that had been needed with those Primarchs He had found of more savage timbre. It is further more recorded that once Guilliman learned the truth of his origins, he immediately swore his fealty to the Emperor, who he knew was his true father, for he had already theorized correctly the purpose for which he had not been born so much as deliberately created. It was immediately apparent to Imperial observers that Roboute Guilliman possessed a powerful analytical intelligence, even when compared to the superhuman cognitive abilities of his peers, as well as talent for statecraft and macro-organisation of staggering potential. Yet few could then guess what such talents harnessed to the Great Crusade would go on to achieve.

The Unification of Body and Soul

The XIIIth Legion of Space Mairnes was assigned to Guilliman in short order, for the Primarch needed little urging or aid in the assimilation of knowledge of the wider galaxy, the Great Crusade and the many technological wonders of the new-born Imperium of Man. It was a development greeted by the XIIIth with great rejoicing and pride in the honour that Roboute Guilliamn paid them in accepting their fealty. The oratory and vision with which their new-found Primarch expounded to them his designs for the future and the righteousness of the Great Crusade filled the Legiones Astartes with a renewed vigiour and dispelled any shadows of doubt in their minds, and made Guilliman's takeover, according to official records, all but seamless.

Roboute Guilliman did far more than merely take command of the XIIIth Legion, he set about transforming it. His vision was for a Legion that was more than simply one army among many, however exceptional, but a self-sustaining power for conquest, order and expansion; the strength of the body and blood of the Imperium made manifest by the will of the Emperor through His servant Roboute Guilliman. To him, a military force was more than the warriors who wielded arms -- it was their chain of supply, the ships which carried them between, the manufactora which supplied their munitions and the worlds which bred their recruits; they were indivisible and equally vital. To Guilliman's mind, all of these things made a Space Marine Legion, and he meant to control them all so that his own would prosper and the Emperor's will be done.

In accordance with his grand design, he planned to not merely take the world of his fosterage as his headquarters and recruiting ground as his peers had done and would continue to do, but from the start set it up as merely the fulcrum of a far larger network of provender and support. The basis of this network would be the worlds Macragge had long maintained links with, but they would merely be its first components, not its fullest extent. This would be the start of Robout Guilliman's "Ultramar" and it would be a project of decades, and continue to expand right up to the first treacherous blow of the Horus Heresy.

The Eagle of the East

As swiftly as he put his plans for Ultramar into action, he embarked on the root and branch re-organisation of his Legion. Adopting an extraordinarily detailed plan which drew from both the military doctrines and political philosophies of his surrogate home world, a detailed study of the history of the XIIIth and each and every other Legion and armed force under the Emperor's banner in their then current form, he remade the organisational structure and tactical doctrines of his Legion accordingly.

The result was an elegantly structured but elaborate and highly meritocratic force. It unsurprisingly built on much that had already been evident in the character of the XIIIth Legion, as their Primarch's gene-seed had already partly shaped them, however unconsciously, and through the application of analysis and reason sought to purge any weaknesses or deficiences to achieve the optimal military outcome. This, as with so much of the Legion's affairs, was considered by the Primarch an ongoing project, and it evolved quickly into a dual doctrine which embraced in parallel on one hand what were the ancient and deterministic values of the warrior: courage, discipline, skill and adaptability, defined as that which was "practical", and on the other: planning, precedent, analysis and assessment, defined as that which was "theoretical". Both were of equal weight and value, one complementing and informing the other, blending together as the metals which made a fine blade. This became the Legion's doctrine and creed. As with the society Roboute Guilliman had built on Macragge, the XIIIth Legion under his mastery would be as ruthlessly even-handed as it was efficient, with the needs of the individual sublimated to the greater whole, but the life of the individual never spent wantonly or without purpose; for the doctrine stated that each Legionary lost weakened those who remained. Within the Legion, the valour and the achievement of the individual were rewarded with honour and responsibility, but the obedience to hierarchy and order it demanded of its members was to be unquestioning and unchallenged. The outward signs of this transformation were striking, the livery of the XIIIth was altered to a deep blue, chased with gold, while the symbol of the ancient "Ultima" glyph found in the pre-isolation stellar charts of the region was adopted as its icon and seal to tie them to the newfound realm which they embodied, and with it the cognomen "Ultramarines", perhaps as one monography attributed to Remembrancer L. Amphidal suggested, "Roboute Guilliman and his Legion would vow to take the Great Crusade beyond the stars themselves if needed to see it completion."

Great Crusade

With its forward base relocated to Macragge, Guilliman was granted independent Crusade command for the region, and quickly set about a series of fresh conquests. His 12th Expeditionary Fleet reformed under his command and supplied with warships of the latest designs from Mars as a boon of the Emperor. Fresh conquests were immediate, as the newly named Ultramarines rapidly expanded their range out from Macragge, identifying suitable targets for Compliance and singling out xenos holds for eradication. Interrupted only when called upon to join larger campaigns by the will of the Emperor, for nearly a century the 12th Expeditionary Fleet ranged as far to the galactic north as the dead expanse where the Dominion of Storms ended and as far to the galactic east and south as the point of Ultima Thule, where the stars paled and emptied out into the limitless darkness of the exo-galactic void.

During this period, the Ultramarines, by some records, succeeded in liberating more worlds than any other single Primarch's forces, and the planets Roboute Guilliman brought within the Imperium always benefitted from his intense passion for efficient and ordered government. Whenever Guilliman and the Ultramarines made a world Compliant, his forces spent as much effort in establishing it afresh, setting up self-supporting defences, and ensuring that in his wake, the agents of the Imperial Truth and industry would firmly seal the world's place in the fabric of the Imperium. This spread of cohesive civilisation in the Legion's path served both to solidify and expand supply lines for its advance, facilitating in no small part the great speed and range of the Ultramarines' conquests.

Within months of the Legion's establishment on Macragge, the first influx of new recruits had arrived at the Fortress of Hera, the Legion's fortress-monastery and new headquarters, and the process of renewal and increase in the XIIIth Legion's fighting strength had begun and never since had ceased. Wave after wave of recruits were taken in and processed, not simply from Macragge and the surrounding worlds of the slowly expanding Ultramar, as numerous as they were, but from scores of worlds and colony outposts where the conquering fleets of Roboute Guilliman had gone. By the time Horus was appointed Warmaster, the Ultramarines were by any official assessment the largest single Space Marine Legion by number of Legionaries with a considerable margin. Owing to this expansion, the now massive 12th Expeditionary Fleet was sub-divided into a score of smaller Expeditionary and Persecution fleets, allowing the Legion to range further, each still numbering scores of vessels and thousands and sometimes tens of thousands of Legionaries. The numeric strength of the Ultramarines Legion, in excess of 250,000 Astartes, would be an achievement that would not be surpassed, though in secrecy the late expansion of the Word Bearers, who originally numbered approximately 100,000 Astartes, would come to rival them by some assessments, while the wilder claims as to the strength of the Alpha Legion also have them run closer than official records would indicate.

This scale of military force and the near autonomous "empire within an empire" that maintained it, Ultramar having reached a dominion popularly ascribed as the Five Hundred Worlds before the outbreak of war, would have dire and unforeseen consequences for the Ultramarines and their Primarch. Separate and inviolate in the east, and a great power within their own right, the Legion's very existence made them a threat to the Traitor's conspiracy that could not be ignored, and on Calth would the Warmaster's plan and the Word Bearer's desire for revenge see that threat destroyed.

Triumph of Ullanor

In the latter years of the 30th Millennium, force of the Imperium undertook the Ullanor Crusade, a vast Imperial assault on the Ork empire of the Overlord Urrlak Urruk. The capital world of this Greenskin stellar empire, and the site of the final assault by the Space Marine Legions, lay in the central Ullanor System of the galaxy's Ullanor Sector. The Crusade included the deployment of 100,000 Space Marines, 8,000,000 Imperial Army troops, and thousands of Imperial starships and their support personnel. The Ullanor Crusade marked the high point of the Great Crusade's vast effort to reunite the scattered colony worlds of humanity. The Orks of Ullanor represented the largest concentration of Greenskins ever defeated by the military forces of the Imperium of Man before the Third War for Armageddon began during the late 41st Millennium. Following the defeat of the Orks of Ullanor, the Emperor of Mankind was to return to Terra to begin work on his vast project to open up the Eldar Webway for Mankind's use. In his place to command the vast forces of the Great Crusade he left Horus. In the aftermath of the Ullanor Crusade, Horus was granted the newly-created title of "Warmaster", the commander-in-chief of all the Emperor’s armies who possessed command authority over all of the other Primarchs and every Expeditionary Fleet of the Great Crusade. When the Emperor proclaimed Horus, Warmaster of the Imperium, Guilliman accepted the news without resentment, and Horus continued to seek his counsel. However, Horus believed that Guilliman felt that he had deserved the honour of being named Warmaster just as much, if not more. Before returning to Terra to oversee the next phase of the creation of his stellar empire, the Emperor suggested to Horus that he rename the XVIth Legion the "Sons of Horus", in honour of their Primarch and to show his preeminent place amongst the other Primarchs. Horus initially declined this honour, not wishing to be set above his brothers, and so his Legion continued as the Luna Wolves for a little while longer. But Horus and the other Primarchs never came to terms with the Emperor's absence. Their hurt feelings over his seeming abandonment of the Great Crusade to pursue a secret project whose purpose he chose not to reveal to his sons laid the seeds of jealousy and resentment that would ultimately blossom into the corruption that begat the Horus Heresy.

Battle of Calth

When the Warmaster Horus turned his back on the Imperium, swore his allegiance to the Ruinous Powers of Chaos, and began the Horus Heresy, his first act before making his break with the Emperor of Mankind open was to lure away as many Loyalist Legions from Terra as possible. Horus ordered Guilliman to lead an expeditionary force to the world of Calth in the Veridian System in the Realm of Ultramar to prepare for a campaign in the Eastern Fringes of the galaxy, where, Horus claimed, an Ork WAAAGH! was massing. Horus expected the Ultramarines to await the arrival of the Word Bearers who would join with the XIIIth Legion in prosecuting a campaign against the Ork menace. Unknown to Guilliman, the XVIIthLegion had long before turned Traitor in service to the Chaos Gods, and its Primarch, Lorgar, gleefully accepted Horus' orders to close the trap on his Legion's long-hated rivals. The Word Bearers' sudden attack decimated Guilliman's Legion fleet, and the Ultramarines' ground troops quickly found themselves impossibly outnumbered by their former allies as the infamous Battle of Calth erupted. The Word Bearers slew their Loyalist foes in droves in the early stages of their surprise attack and pushed them back over huge stretches of territory. The Traitors rejoiced at the terrible blows they were inflicting upon the Legion that had once aided the Emperor in humiliating them upon the world of Khur decades before the start of the Heresy when they had been taken to task for repeated violations of the atheistic philosophy known as the Imperial Truth. Unknown to them, Guilliman's flagship, which had survived the initial Word Bearers' attack on the Ultramarines fleet, effected emergency repairs and regrouped with the other surviving Ultramarine star ships in space. Having taken stock of his remaining forces, Guilliman sent an immediate astropathic distress call to Macragge.

The Loyalist Marines on Calth, Ultramarines all, had been forced into a fighting retreat, but soon occupied fortified positions. Many Ultramarines had been born on Calth, and proved more resolute than the Word Bearers anticipated. In space, Guilliman's vessels began hit-and-run attacks on their over-confident enemy. Guilliman assessed his ground troops' positions and broadcast clear, concise orders to each pocket of defense, coordinating them into a cohesive force. One Ultramarine force led by Captain Ventanus led a breakout and retook Calth's Defence Laser silos, aiding the sorely-pressed Ultramarines fleet from the surface of Calth. Guilliman's depleted forces slowed the Word Bearers down long enough for the remainder of the Ultramarines Legion to arrive and rout the Traitor Marines from the system, though at a heavy cost. The Word Bearers turned Calth's own orbital defense platforms on the Veridian star, stripping away the outer layers of its photosphere and destabilizing it, ultimately rendering the surface of Calth uninhabitable. At the same time, the Word Bearers had used the battle taking place on Calth to summon a massive Warp Storm called the Ruinstorm, that was intended to cut off Ultramar from the rest of the galaxy and prevent the Ultramarines from providing any reinforcements to Terra as Horus made his assault upon humanity's home world. The eruption of the Ruinstorm cut off Calth from the main body of the Ultramarines Legion and left the Astartes of the XIIIth Legion trapped on Calth locked in a brutal subterranean war with those Word Bearers units that had also been left behind when their Legion retreated from the Viridian System. Yet Roboute Guilliman and a large portion of his Legion had remained off-world as a result of the Word Bearers' devious assault upon the Ultramarines fleet. Bloodied but unbowed, the Ultramarines received the orders of Malcador the Sigillite, the Emperor's Regent, while he was indisposed pursuing the secret Imperial Webway Project, and prepared to meet the needs of the Imperium's defense against the Traitor Legions as best they could.

Shadow Crusade

In his wrath, the Lord of Ultramar had gathered what vessels he could spare after Kor Phaeron's ambush, drawn additional numbers from the first Ultramarines relief fleet bound for Calth after the massacre above that world, and tracked Lorgar directly through the use of the XIIIth Legion’s own astropathic choirs. In the wake of the Battle of Calth, the Word Bearers Legion, led by Lorgar, linked up with Angron and his World Eaters Legion to launch a Shadow Crusade against the Realm of Ultramar's Five Hundred Worlds in an attempt to spread the massive Warp Storm known as the Ruinstorm that had been conjured by the Word Bearers' First Chaplain Erebus at Calth across the Eastern Fringe. This prodigious Warp Storm would effectively split the galaxy in half and deny needed reinforcements to the Loyalists as Horus drove on Terra in an attempt to overthrow the Emperor of Mankind.

The Shadow Crusade laid waste to 26 worlds until Guilliman's retribution fleet finally caught up to the Traitors upon Angron's homeworld of Nuceria, which the World Eaters Legion were preoccupied with wiping clean of all life in vengeance for the treatment the Nucerians had merited out a century before to Angron. The XIIIth Legion warship Courage Above All, Guilliman's temporary flagship, broke Warp at the system’s edge, at the head of a large void armada consisting of 41 vessels. The Ultramarines armada looked wounded, cobbled together from separate fleets. It was not a dedicated interdiction war-fleet, but clearly a ragtag strike force, a lance thrust to the enemy’s heart. Guilliman himself had done the best he could with limited resources. The XIIIth Legion's Cruisers and Battleships ran abeam of the enemy fleet for repeated exchange of broadsides, offering targets too big and powerful to ignore, while the rest of the Ultramarines fleet used calculated Lance strikes from safer range. The armada then divided its assault potential, doing its utmost to destroy Lorgar's flagship Fidelitas Lex, and attempted to take the World Eaters' flagship Conqueror in a boarding action.

But the Ultramarines' warships not only fought a void war, they also attempted to take the fight to the surface of Nuceria, for this attack was personal. The Ultramarines had come for revenge against Lorgar and the Word Bearers, just as they had pursued Kor Phaeron all the way to the Maelstrom on the other side of Ultramar. Several Ultramarines warships attempted to make a run on Nuceria, haemorrhaging Drop Pods, landers and gunships, forcing planetfall by any means necessary. The Ultramarines fleet swept over and against the Traitors like an insect horde. But the tenacious commander of the Conqueror, Lotara Sarrin, put up a difficult fight and destroyed a number of Ultramarines vessels that attempted to make a run for the surface. Though the World Eaters' flagship transformed a number of the smaller vessels into flaming wreckage, the Ultramarines eventually punched through her tenacious defence and managed to land troops on the surface of Nuceria.

Meanwhile, the Fidelitas Lex was already a ruin, its armour pitted and cracked, its shields a memory. The cathedrals and spinal fortresses barnacling along its back were gone, laid waste by the Ultramarines’ incendiary rage. The XIIIth Legion's armada attacked in strafing runs and protracted exchanges of broadsides, trading fire with the superior warship and accepting their own casualties as the cost of bleeding the bigger vessel dry. Each assault left the Lex weaker, firing fewer turrets and cannons, taking punishment on its increasingly fragile armour. But she fought on. Crawling with smaller ships, the Lex lashed back with its remaining Macro-cannons, rolling in the light of its own burning hull. Guilliman guided the battle from the command deck of Courage Above All, and had decided that the Lex would die first, killed in the death of a thousand cuts and swept from the game board, while the Conqueror would be boarded and killed from within. In the course of the battle in Nucerian orbit, the Conqueror could not rise to its sister-ship's defense. Both Traitor Legion flagships fought alone, starved of support and suffering the endless attacks of the XIIIth Legion’s ragged armada. Salvation Pods streamed from the Lex’s sides and underbelly, along with heavier Mechanicum craft and bulk landers. With the Legionaries of the Word Bearers already on the surface, the ship’s human population fled in the vessel’s final minutes. And still the great vessel fought -- rolling, turning, raging. The Ultramarines Cruisers that drifted past burned as badly as the warship they were killing. This void battle was a form of dirty fighting between warships, too close for the neat calculations of ranged battery fire. Instead, it was an up close and personal slug fest.

The Ultramarines Battle Barge Armsman intercepted the Conqueror and came abeam, launching Assault Carriers and Boarding Torpedoes. While the World Eaters flagship was busy repelling boarders, a number of smaller XIIIth Legion vessels slipped past her defenses and launched Drop Pods, gunships and troop carriers. The first Drop Pods hammered home on the planet's surface. Sealed doors unlocked and the first Ultramarines poured forth, Bolters raised, moving in perfect and well-trained unity. But the World Eaters were waiting for them. Those not lost to the Butcher's Nails at once had the presence of mind to note that these Ultramarines were not the pristine cobalt-blue warriors they had previously faced on the War World of Armatura. These Legionaries of the XIIIth wore cracked Power Armour, still scarred and burn washed from some horrendous battle weeks or months before. These were hardened veterans of the Calth Atrocity. They burned with a cold intensity to carry out the vengeance in their hearts, and were intent on getting to grips with the Word Bearers.

As was their way, the Ultramarines established footholds at defensible positions, clearing room for their reinforcements to land. For every position they held, another was overrun by the World Eaters in a storm of roaring axes, or lost to the Word Bearers' chanting, implacable advance. The XIIth Legion crashed against the XIIIth in rabid packs, showing why Imperial forces had feared to fight alongside them for decades. Uncontrolled, unbound, unrestrained, they butchered their way through Ultramarines strong points, enslaved to the joy of battle because of the Butcher's Nails cortical implants sandwiched within the meat of their minds. The XVIIthLegion also met their Loyalist cousins, replacing ferocity with spite and hate. The Ultramarines returned it in kind, hungry for vengeance against the vile Traitors who had defiled Calth and damaged its star. Word Bearers units marched, droning black hymns and chanting sermons from the Book of Lorgar, bearing corpse-strewn icons of befouled metal and bleached bones above their regiments.

As the fighting raged, the burning shell of the Fidelitas Lex cut through the clouds into the planet's atmosphere, shuddering on its way east, rolling ever downwards, achingly slow for something of such scale. The weight of the Lex's massive plasma engines dragged the stern down first, colliding with the Nucerian ocean's surface far from shore. In the meantime, the demigod in gold and blue had finally found the object of his obsession amidst the clamor of war. Guilliman confronted Lorgar, possessing the advantage of two weapons, but Lorgar's Crozius gave him a reach his brother lacked. When they first met, there was no furious trading of frantic blows, nor were there any melodramatic speeches of vengeance avowed. The two Primarchs came together once, Power Fist against War Maul, and backed away from the resulting flare of repelling energy fields. Their warriors killed each other around them both, and neither Primarch spared their sons a glance. Lorgar flicked the clinging lightning from the head of his Crozius, shaking his head in slow denial.

Both Primarchs fought without heeding their warriors, their godlike movements an inconceivable blur to the Space Marines fighting around them. None had ever imagined the heroes of this new age would take the field against each other, nor could they have predicted the wellsprings of spite between them. Guilliman confronted Lorgar for what his Legion had done across the Five Hundred Worlds of Ultramar. In his righteous anger the Ultramarines Primarch struck Lorgar with one of his fists, battering the Word Bearers Primarch's sternum. Lorgar repulsed him with a projected burst of telekinesis, weak and wavering, but enough to send his brother staggering. The Crozius followed, its power field trailing lightning as Lorgar hammered it into the side of Guilliman’s head with the force of a cannonball. Both Primarchs faced each other beneath the grey sky, one bleeding internally, the other with half of his face lost to blood sheeting from a fractured skull.

As the two Primarchs were locked in their furious life-and-death struggle, they were oblivious to the destruction being wrought around them. Suddenly, Angron burst forth from the Ultramarines ranks, his armour a shattered wreck, and both of his Chainswords spat gobbets of ceramite armour plating and scarlet gore. Angron was plastered with the blood of the slain after hours in the crush of the front lines of intense combat. On his chest hung a bandoleer of skulls taken from the mass grave at Desh'elika Ridge. Blood painted them as surely as it marked Angron. Even through the constant pain generated by the Butcher's Nails, that pleased him. He wanted his deceased brothers and sisters to taste blood once more. He had carried them with him across Nuceria, letting their empty eyes witness the razing of his former, hated homeworld. The World Eater launched himself at Guilliman with murderous hatred. The two Primarchs fell into a seamless, roaring duel where Lorgar and Guilliman had abandoned theirs. Guilliman was forced back by the storm of Angron's blows.

As the two Primarchs fought, Guilliman landed a glancing blow, his fist pounding across Angron's breastplate. One of the skulls of Angron's fallen kinsman that hung from the chain worn across his breastplate was partially shattered and scattered across the ground. Guilliman stepped back, his boot crushing a skull's remnants to powder. Angron saw it, and threw himself at his brother, his howl of wrath defying mortal origins, impossibly ripe in its anguish. Lorgar saw it, too. The moment Guilliman's boot broke the skull, he felt the Warp boil behind the veil. The Bearer of the Word started chanting in a language never before spoken by any living being, his words in faultless harmony with Angron's cry of torment. Lorgar enacted his dark plan to save his brother's life, summoning the Ruinstorm to the world of Nuceria, tearing the sky open and unleashing a crimson torrent, formed from the ghosts of a hundred murdered worlds, raining blood. Guilliman had been holding his own against both Traitor Primarchs, until Lorgar ceased his attack and started his achingly resonant chant. Angron and Roboute still fought, with the Lord of the Ultramarines giving ground each time Angron landed a blow. Angron plunged his Chainsword up under Guilliman’s breastplate -- a shallow stab, but a telling one. The Ultramarines Primarch crushed the impaling sword in one fist and staggered back, truly bleeding now.

Despite the maelstrom of combat and sorcery raging around them, Angron still fought Guilliman, standing above the kneeling Ultramarine Primarch. He had not even noticed the storm of blood streaming from the sky in a red torrent. Sparks sprayed from Roboute’s raised gauntlets as he struggled to ward off blow after blow. He was beaten and down. His wounds bled profusely, a palette of proud defeat. His warriors fought desperately to retrieve him. Fortunately they were granted a brief reprieve, as Lorgar's incantation locked up Angron's muscles, and began to transform the Red Angel into a new form as a Daemon Prince of Khorne. Guilliman took the opportunity to escape into his sons' defiant phalanxes, retreating in enviable unity. Lorgar saw the expression of disgusted awe on his brother's face as the wounded Ultramarine stared at Angron's metamorphosis atop the mound of dead sons from all three bloodlines of Space Marines. The XIIIth Legion continued to fire even in retreat, leaving the world of Nuceria battered and bloody. Their campaign against the two Traitor Legions was over..for now.

Roboute Guilliman escaped from Nuceria, unable to face or even fully comprehend what both of his brothers had become through their corruption by the Ruinous Powers. The World Eaters completed their purge of Nuceria until not one human life remained on the benighted world. Angron, now the very embodiment of the Blood God's Eight-Fold Path, shook the dust of the world from his feet and did not think of it again.

Battle of Terra

As the long and bloody years of the Horus Heresy passed, the Traitor Legions under the command of the Warmaster Horus finally closed on the homeworld of Mankind and launched their great assault against the Imperial Palace while they believed a good portion of the Loyalist Space Marine Legions remained occupied in other regions of the galaxy. While the Forces of Chaos came close to battering down the gates of the Palace, the Loyalists' stout defence managed to hold the line long enough for Loyalist reinforcements to drop from the Warp on the edges of the Sol System. Salvation was coming. In orbit of Terra, Horus' allies delivered the fateful news to the Warmaster while he sat directing the battle for the Imperial Palace. The Ultramarines, Dark Angels and Space Wolves Legions were only hours away from reinforcing the Emperor and his Loyalist defenders. Horus knew that his gamble had failed. What happened next is disputed, some believe Horus disabled his shields as he experienced one last moment of regret, and some believe it was a personal challenge to the Emperor. Nevertheless, Horus lowered the shields of his flagship Battle Barge Vengeful Spirit, allowing the Emperor, the Blood Angels' Primarch Sanguinius and a company of Imperial Fists to teleport aboard and slay him, ending the Horus Heresy. The Emperor was mortally wounded in the exchange and interred in the Golden Throne immediately afterwards by the Primarch Rogal Dorn, leaving a dangerous void of power and authority in the Imperium.

The Ultramarines did not arrive until after Horus' defeat, and they found Terra and the Imperium in ruins. Guilliman steadfastly refused to allow the Imperium to fall, and began dispatching elements of his Legion to all corners of the galaxy to stem the tide of invasion and unrest as the other Loyalist forces recovered and rearmed. After a decade of intense fighting, stability was restored. To prevent a single commander having as many superhuman Astartes at his command as Horus had, Guilliman reformulated the sizes of all of the Loyalist Space Marine Legions into thousand-man Chapters, breaking apart the 9 original Loyalist First Founding Legions into the much smaller Second Founding Chapters. Never again would one man, no matter how noble and unblemished his motives, wield the power of an entire Space Marine Legion. The rationale and proper organisation of Space Marine Chapters are the main topic in Guilliman's masterwork of strategy, the Codex Astartes.

Whilst the Horus Heresy plunged the Imperium into savagery and civil war, the Ultramarines were engaged on the southern edge of the galaxy. Their very success had carried them far from Terra and isolated them from the conquering Traitor Legions of the Warmaster Horus which had been concentrated in the galactic northeast. News of Horus' treachery did not reach the Ultramarines until the attack on Earth was underway. Thanks to the speed of Horus' attack there was little that Roboute Guilliman could do in support of his Emperor during the crucial Battle of Terra. None of the worlds already liberated by the Ultramarines were in serious danger from the Forces of Chaos. Consequently, the Ultramarines were poorly placed to contribute during the early stages of the Horus Heresy.

Post-Heresy Imperial Reformation

The Loyalist Space Marine Legions had lost tens of thousands of troops during the fighting of the Heresy, and half of the original 18 Legions had sided with Horus and been corrupted by Chaos. As a result, the number of Astartes left to the Imperium after the end of the Heresy was very few, yet never were they more needed.

The confusion and disorder following the Horus Heresy had left the Imperium weak and vulnerable. Everywhere the enemies of mankind prepared to attack. Many worlds remained in the grip of Chaos. Into this breach stepped Roboute Guilliman and the Ultramarines. Always the largest of the Astartes Legions, the Ultramarines found themselves divided and dispatched all over the Imperium in a desperate effort to stem the tide of invasion and unrest. The Ultramarines successfully held the Imperium together during a time of intense danger. Macragge was able to supply new recruits at such a rate that before long the Ultramarines alone accounted for more than half the total number of Space Marines, and few were the star systems where their heroism went unnoticed. Within a decade, order was restored to the Imperium. Even as the Ultramarines reconquered, a new theory of warfare was emerging. Under the guidance of the Ultramarines' Primarch, the Codex Astartes was taking shape. Its doctrines would reshape the future of all Space Marines and forevermore dictate the foundation for the Imperium's military strength and the ultimate survival of Mankind.

The Second Founding of the Space Marines was decreed seven years after the death of Horus and the end of his Heresy. Most of the old Loyalist Legions divided into fewer than 5 Successor Chapters, but the Ultramarines were divided many times. The exact number of Successor Chapters created from the Ultramarines is uncertain: the number listed in the oldest copy of the Codex Astartes gives the total as 23, but does not name them. With the Second Founding, the size of the Ultramarines force was much reduced. Most of the Space Marines left Macragge to establish new Chapters elsewhere. The Ultramarines' fortress-monastery was built to accommodate more than ten times as many Space Marines as now remained on their homeworld. As a result its arsenals and weapon shops were partially dismantled and taken by the new Chapters to found their own bases. The genetic banks of the Ultramarines, and the huge recruitment organisation, were similarly reduced. As a result of the Second Founding, the Ultramarines' gene-seed became pre-eminent across the Imperium. The new Chapters created from the Ultramarines during the Second Founding are often referred to as the Primogenitors, or "first-born". The lasting heritage of Guilliman was not only genetic, but spiritual. Even to this day, 10,000 standard years later, all the Primogenitor Chapters venerate Roboute Guilliman as their own founding father and patron, and hold the ruler of Ultramar, whoever he be, as the exemplar of all that it means to be a Space Marine. So did the Ultramarines rise to become preeminent amongst their brother Chapters.

Death of the Avenging Son

Roboute Guilliman continued to serve with the Ultramarines Chapter, leading them for a hundred years after the Second Founding. It was said that during those years, Guilliman led several incursions alongside his brother Primarchs against the remaining Chaos Space Marines. During one incursion, Guilliman faced his former brother Primarch Alpharius of the Alpha Legion, and slew him in single combat (though the precise details of this event remain in doubt, even to the Ultramarines). The Ultramarines, however, were forced to withdraw from the combat, as to their shock the Alpha Legion's Traitor Marines fought on despite the apparent loss of their Primarch. Guilliman would meet eventually his ultimate fate during the Battle of Thessala in 121.M31, when he encountered one of the Traitor Primarchs, Fulgrim of the Emperor's Children, who had become a Daemon Prince of Slaanesh. During this encounter with his former brother, Fulgrim managed to fatally injure Guilliman in the neck with a poisonous sword (which was remarkably similar to the Anathame sword that was used by Dark Apostle Erebus to fatally wound Horus on Davin's moon).

Fatally poisoned by his one-time brother, Roboute was transported back to Macragge in a stasis field, and has remained entombed in the field for 10,000 years, frozen in time. Although physically impossible within the null-time of a stasis field, it is believed by many pilgrims to his shrine that his wounds are healing, and that one day he will awaken again when the Imperium needs him most. The Shrine of Guilliman built to contain his body is one of the most holy places in the entire Imperium, and one which welcomes millions of pilgrims every year. It lies within the Temple of Correction, a vaulted sepulcher forming a small part of the Ultramarines' vast northern polar fortress on Macragge. The temple is a miracle of construction and typical of the attention to detail to which the Ultramarines apply themselves. Its proportions defy the human mind by the scope and grandeur of its design. The multi-colored glass dome that forms the roof is the largest of its kind. Even the Techno-magi of the Adeptus Mechanicus come to marvel at the structure said to have been designed by Roboute Guilliman himself. According to the Ultramarines there is enough marble within the temple to build a mountain, and sufficient adamantium and shining plasteel to construct a sizable Imperial warfleet.

Within this edifice is the great marble throne of Roboute Guilliman, and upon that throne sits a regal corpse. Though the best part of 10,000 years have passed since his death, the Primarch's body is perfectly preserved. Even his death wounds from Fulgrim's blade are visible upon his throat. His mortal remains are preserved from the ravages of time by means of a stasis field that isolates the Primarch from the time-stream of normal four-dimensional space-time. Everything encompassed by the field is trapped in time and can neither change nor decay. There are some, however, who claim the Primarch's wounds do change. They say that Guilliman's body is slowly recovering and that his wounds show mysterious signs of healing. Others deny the phenomena, and point out the sheer scientific impossibility of change within the stasis field. Yet enough believe the stories to come and witness for themselves the miracle of the Primarch, generation after generation.

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