Editing The 13th Black Crusade (section)

===Tumbling Down===

Word of the aftermath of brutal raids similar to what happened to Dentor eventually filtered back to Segmentum command, but with its forces stretched by pague zombies, armed mobs, and Chaos Warfleets, there was little it could do. The settlements on Sarlax and Amistel fell, and video recordings confirmed that Heretic Marine forces were indeed in the area. A discernable pattern emerged of the direction of the attacks, and all information seemed to indicate they were heading in the direction of Cadia. In preparation, the Imperial Navy slowly pulled all available ships and not dead/zombified/hospitalized personnell to prepare a defence.

While Imperial forces consolidated, they were by no means finished. On Lelithar, a figure calling himself [[Cypher|The Voice of the Emperor]] was causing unrest and dissent. With his [[Nazi|powerful speeches]], he stirred the restless populations into open sedition, and his followers quickly overran vital Imperial facilities like bases and stockpiles. Once he and his followers had taken the space ports, the rebellion spread uncontrolled across the sector, with his cults appearing on the worlds of Yayor, Amistel, Albitern, and Bar-El. This not only caused a substantial loss of material and manpower, but also created a secondary front that would benefit the forces of Chaos in the long run.

The disruption the Voice's followers had caused spurred an immediate intellectual response form the Imperials: call him a heretic and fight for the sector. Civilian and military forces in the sector rallied around this cause, especially the promise of being able to avenge some of the worlds that had been devastated. In an effort to shorten the war, Command ordered Kill-Teams and assassins to try and kill the Voice, but these efforts all failed.