Editing Cromwald Walgrun (section)

===Youth===

The early years of Cromwald were far removed from the lofty heights of a master of armies. From his pod the young primarch lived as an orphan in the pre-industrial streets of Sommesgard, where survival was a matter of wits, charisma and luck. Possessing all three, Cromwald grew rapidly into a shrewd and cunning survivor whose wit and impressive stature gained him the attention and patronage of Captain Edgar Walgrun of the Prathian army. Seeing potential in the young man, he afforded Cromwald the finest education and privilege of wealth and station. Given his origins, Cromwald plunged headlong into the indulgences of his newfound wealth; he consumed every new experience with a voracious appetite. He glutted himself on books and knowledge, threw himself headlong into the finer trappings of his newfound station, and found a drive to see the world anew with every opportunity to travel and test himself physically and mentally. Quickly Cromwald met the limits of what the world had to offer, and resolved himself to pursue new avenues. If the world could not give him a new adventure, he would make one for himself. He threw the wealth and prestige of the Walgrun name behind countless endeavors, becoming a patron of the sciences that would drive Prathia into an industrial age. With the revolution of automation, new methods of exploration and adventure opened up before him, but as with all things, these new sciences were turned to the purpose of war. 

Sommesgard was host to regular clashes of nations in the constant shifting of power across the globe. These battles were fought in trenches and columns, with rifle and cannon. The revolution of industry had yet to transform the face of war on Sommesgard, until Prathia began to swell under the surge of raw scientific progress. The armies under her banner were armed with the fruits of the new industry, with engines capable of bearing soldiers over great distances in safety, and weapons of terrible power compared to the rifles of old. As with the sciences, Cromwald became a patron of the military. His education included extensive training in strategy and military history, and he took well to the lessons of exercising force on a national level. He became a pioneer of the new orders of battle, personally sponsoring and testing armored vehicles and mighty weapons in the crucible of combat against Prathia's neighbors.

Though gifted in battle, the true measure of Cromwald's genius as a general came with his boldness, his willingness to bring untested methods and engines to the front lines and apply them with stunning results. Under his command the first divisions of armored tanks rolled across the enemy lines in an unstoppable wave, while infantry clashed with aggressive strategies that relied of steely nerves and daring bravado to seize the initiative. Those nations unswayed by the boisterous oratory of the newly minted Field Marshal Walgrun fell swiftly to his relentless pursuit of global unification under one banner. Though he never claimed ambitions to rule, none would deny that when the final battle ended and the world was made as one, the prosperity to follow was the work of his hands.

A full decade of technological and social advancement followed, interrupted abruptly by the annihilation of the old state of Berau. Once a center for industry, Berau was wiped from the face of the earth by a monstrous meteor impact. The first rock fell directly into the city center, and soon after waves of other, lesser meteors crashed into Sommesgard in a hail of destruction. From these rocks poured forth a violent tide of barbarian greenskins, a foe unlike anything the people of Sommesgard had ever known. The ensuing war was savage, as the initial wave of orks overran a full half of the planet unchecked with their fury and superior engines of war. Cromwald, the unmatched and unbeatable general saw victory wherever he made a stand, but across the rest of Sommesgard losses were catastrophic in the face of terrifying walkers and steel behemoths. At the heart of it all rose a foul effigy to the Orky gods; a stompa constructed by the big mek leading the green tide. In a desperate bid to break the advancing horde, Cromwald led an armored spearhead against the titanic war machine, but found himself nearly annihilated alongside his vehicle under the massive guns of the stompa. With his right arm obliterated in the blast, he was forced to board the stompa and fight his way to the mek bare handed and injured, with only his innate inhuman physiology sustaining him. He broke the ork morale with the defeat of the big mek, and claimed a crude bionik arm as a trophy to replace the limb he had lost.

The following war waged on for decades, with the implacable will of the men of Sommesgard tested sorely against the brutality of the orks. Only with the coming of the Emperor was the battle finally won. His arrival was heralded with a counter-invasion of astartes, who joined the beleaguered defenders to break the green tide once and for all. The meeting of father and son was heralded with triumphant fanfare as it marked the end of a long and bitter generation of terror and strife.