Editing Iron Gaze (section)

====The War on Nazareth====

Nazareth was a thriving Forge World located in Anatolex sector in galactic southeast, on the borders of Segmentum Ultima, colonized by humans during the final days of the Great Crusade, before the Horus Heresy. During the Heresy, the planet managed to avoid majority of conflict by virtue of being somewhat distant from main Imperial population hubs, such as kingdom of Ultramar. Because of this, the facilities on Nazareth were among first ones to continue producing their technological marvels at full capacity after the Heresy, which they continued for next several millennia.

During the Nova Terra Interregnum in M34 and M35, Nazareth became a sort of safe haven for more liberal-minded tech-priests of Adeptus Mechanicus. This led to a particularly high concentration of high-ranking officers of Mechanicus, and an uncommonly high level of tolerance when it came to experimenting with xenotech. While Mechanicus wasn’t satisfied with such borderline heretical tendencies, Nazareth remained an industrial powerhouse of the region. and its officers commanded enough of political power to prevent any open hostilities. Nonetheless, the experiments were conducted as discreetly as possible, and allegiance of local human population was unquestionably in favor of Imperium and the Emperor, so the practices were allowed to continue, and even trade with nearby Tau colony.

During the year 866 M39, a sudden Warp Storm shrouded entire sector, cutting off all travel and communications. Not allowing for this nuisance to get in the way of industrial output, Archmagos Intendant Amenhal, highest ranked Mechanicus present and one of co-rulers of Nazareth, immediately put millenias of xenotech experiments to use. The focus was on establishing a transport line to the nearest Agriworld, Galil, which they managed with a Warp-resistant ships outfitted with Tau technology.

With the steady stream of basic life necessities, tech-priests of Nazareth went back to their experiments. As centuries went by, the abundant resources of Nazareth started to run out, forcing the workers to dig deeper and deeper into the planets crust. Somewhere around the year 139 M40, the workers broke into vast underground cavern complex filled with pyramidal structures and highly advanced technology. It didn’t take long for tech-priests to identify this as Necron technology, and realizing that Nazareth was a Tomb World all along, although Necrons complexes were somewhat deeper than usual. Before a proper response could be formulated by the planetary government, the complex started to come to life and a small number of Necrons attacked the explorers.

Thankfully for Imperials, Warpstorm surrounding the sector somehow interfered with the awakening protocol of the necrons, slowing it immensely. This allowed the defenders to stand firmly against the small Necron vanguard and heavily fortify path to surface before the Necrons could reach it and lay devastation to civilian population.

The standoff continued for months, with Necrons slowly awakening, but being kept at bay by advanced hybrid technology of the defenders. Furthermore, tech-priests jumped at the chance to examine the reality-bending technology of Necrons, and even starting to reverse-engineer it, bit by bit. At one point, the Necron Lord of Nazareth himself awoke, and immediately put their secret weapon to use: the very same pyramidal structures first expedition found months earlier. Apparently, the structures were a previously unseen Necron weapons, a mobile fortresses designed to drill deep into the crust of planet, easily turning the planet into Tomb World in no time. Unfortunately for the human defenders, just as they were able to drill down, the pyramids were able to drill up. Massive earthquakes started to shake the very foundations of industrial cities of Nazareth, and within hours, the first of hundreds of pyramids started to break through to surface, bypassing Imperial fortifications and instantly destroying their entire surrounding and letting hundreds of Necrons out. 

Tens of millions of humans died within days, even with valiant defense raised by Planetary Defense Force and Mechanicus priests. The battle continued to rage for years, with majority of population pulling to orbital stations and leaving the surface to Necron forces. Soon, Nazareths tectonic plates, already heavily damaged by the unburrowing of Necron pyramids and further destabilized by constant orbital bombardments by the defenders, started to break, creating vast chasms the size of oceans with dozens of levels of cavern complexes. During the conflict, neither sides managed to keep any kind of territory for long. Neither Imperials were able to push back Necrons due to their slowly awakening but constantly streaming in reinforcements, neither Necrons were able to break past the orbital line of the defense the humans quickly set up.

After almost a century of fighting, constant advances in hybrid technology and cybernetic augments the humans managed to produce started to thin out Necron forces. Slowly but surely, humans pushed the robotic menace back. But Necrons were never the ones to lay down in defeat. It is said that as the defenders pushed against them, led by Archmagos Intendant Amenhal himself, the Necrons pulled together their last forces and energies in Central Pyramid, with Necron Lord himself becoming a conduit for their last resort weapon: an incredibly powerful fiery pulse that propagated itself across the whole planet, breaching into orbit and burning majority of atmosphere and destroying both Necrons and humans alike.

Two groups of humans survived: the civilians aboard ships that were mobile enough to escape the blast, and several detachments of surface-bound defenders that were armored and/or augmented enough to survive the pulse long enough to find shelter in the underground caverns.