Golgothos

Golgothos the Fervent
Golgothos of Sepulchra
Discovered (world)	Sepulchra
Discovered (period)	898.M30
Legion	Sixth
Heraldry/Sigil
Horus Heresy role	Loyalist

This page details people, events, and organisations from The /tg/ Heresy, a fan re-working of the Warhammer 40,000 Universe.

Golgothos, Primarch of The Entombed

Golgothos has disappeared. From this day on many will ask if he is dead, and as the years turn to centuries men will more often believe that he could not have survived so long. I put it that the whole question is absurd. Golgothos' stubborn will embodied the spirit of mankind. So long as there is one man to wonder if the Primarch lives, it can be certain that he does.

(Excerpt from Golgothos the Eternal by Gaspard Lumey)

Appearance

Before his internment, Golgothos had bone white skin, and a bald head. He was a skinny, malnourished man, with visible bones from 30 years of malnourishment and overexertion. During the Great Crusade, Golgothos was interred in an Ossuary Pattern Dreadnought. His Dreadnought is massive, dull grey with white details, and his own skull is mounted for the head. The Contemptor-class Dreadnought has a minor modification: flanking the decorative skull, on either side, are repositories with the skulls of fallen entombed veterans stacked within. These repositories, large rectangular things, would eventually be integrated into the bulkier design of later dreadnoughts. On one side of the dreadnought, where an arm should be, is a massive Demolisher Cannon, capable of leveling entire buildings. On the other side is a mighty power fist, which has crushed Golgothos' hated foes many times.

Youth

Golgothos' pod crashed into the caves of an Ork-populated world called Sepulchra. He spent the first 30 years of his life in complete isolation, believing himself to be the only one of his kind. For many years, Golgothos fled from the Orks, fearing for his life. One day, he discovered an ancient vessel from the Dark Age of Technology. The vessel had served as a deep-space colonization ship, with the passengers in hyperbaric sleep. Their sleep chambers had failed long ago, however, and all that remained were bones. He came to believe he was a god, the last of his kind, sent to punish the Orks for their impurity. Within the vessel he discovered an ancient power fist and power armour, and with it, the hunted became the hunter.

The Coming of The Emperor

Golgothos' discovery of the Dark Age ship changed everything. He began to hunt the Orks of Sepulchra, and for many years they lived in fear of him. Eventually, a warboss named Skullgub managed to rally the Orks to hunt Golgothos down. Skullgub cornered the primarch in a dead-end cavern near the surface, and sent wave after wave of orks after Golgothos. He fought with a fury, having no sense of self preservation or mercy, and fell upon the Orks in a frenzied rage. Golgothos knew he would die, but did not care so long as he could take the Orks with him.

Just as the Orks were closing in for the kill, however, drop pods crashed through from the surface into the cavern. The Emperor and his Astartes poured forth, and made quick work of Skullgub and his mob. Golgothos had long thought himself to be the last scion of a race of gods, and yet here before him stood an army of them, along with their king. He could not express this faith, for he did not know how to speak. It is good that he did not, for the Emperor might have struck him down then and there.

The Emperor brought Golgothos into orbit, and stayed there for several months, teaching his son language, tactics, and the ways of humanity. Once the Emperor deemed Golgothos ready, he was given the Sixth Legion, who he named The Entombed, and the dead marched off to war.

The Great Crusade

Golgothos took to the Great Crusade with unmatched ferocity. Immediately upon being given his legion he led a campaign against the Eldar of craftworkd Kaelor, which floated menacingly close to Sepulchra. The Warlocks of Kaelor were powerful and numerous, but The Entombed had a natural resistance to the powers of the warp, and managed to cripple the craftworld. Golgothos found other victories in pushing back Waaaghs from the northern marches as well as finally exterminating the Orks of Sepulchra.

Soon after his early victories, Golgothos fell ill. None of his Apothecaries could heal him, and so the Emperor was called to his aid. When the Emperor healed his son, he found that the sickness quickly returned, and could not be prevented. The Emperor called upon Johannes Vrach, the most skilled primarch in medicine, to study Golgothos' illness. Vrach performed countless experiments upon his brother, and learned that Golgothos' genes were degenerating. Without constant healing from the Emperor, Golgothos would eventually die. Johannes devised a device which could save Golgothos, a giant mechanical exosceleton with an advanced medical suite, capable of making advanced genetic corrections daily. Golgothos was interred within the armour, thus becoming the first of the Dreadnoughts. Unbeknownst to Golgothos and the Emperor, however, Johannes kept the genetic data he had gathered, and would one day use it as a weapon.

Golgothos was a religious man before he was rescued by The Emperor, believing him to be the last scion of a race of gods. When he discovered mankind lived, he exalted, and declared The Emperor to be the king of the gods. Golgothos' religious zeal would be passed on to his legion, who believed it was their holy quest to purge the galaxy of xenos, witches, and heretics. During the great crusade, Golgothos declared a new form of soldier would be created, called a Chaplain. These chaplains invoked the faith of their bretheren to maintain their resolve, or push them against difficult odds. The morale given by the chaplains was instrumental in the success of The Entombed on zone mortalis missions. Where other astartes feared to tread, the mighty armour and implacable will of The Entombed kept them marching onward.

The Entombed were naturally tight-lipped and aloof, and so it took The Emperor a long time to learn of this heresy. He came to Sepulchra in a fury, but learned quickly that things were not as dire as they seemed. He learned that a handful of officers were leading the rest of the Legion astray, and complete extermination was not necessary. Still, the Entombed needed to be punished for their heresy, and so only one in five Entombed were allowed to live. Those Entombed sentenced to death did not fight or resist, they stood implacably in rows, and did not flinch as their brothers were executed beside them. Only one marine resisted, Obitus, the high Cardinal, who had founded and dogmatized this heretical faith, dared to face the Emperor in combat, but did not even manage to strike him before being defeated.

At the end of the crusade, The Entombed numbered Ten Thousand.

The Heresy

Golgothos was infuriated by the betrayal of Hektor. The thought of in-fighting among the gods when there were so many xenos to purge threw him into a fury. The Emperor knew well the strengths of his legions, and knew that Golgothos and his kin had an unnatural resistance to the powers of the warp. As such, Golgothos was sent with haste to take out Ostium, the homeworld of the Black Augurs. The Entombed's zone mortalis tactics served them well on the small hiveworld, and the Augurs were forced to give more and more ground.

Just as victory seemed assured, the unthinkable happened. A thick red fog filled the streets of the hiveworld, and washed over the Entombed fighting on the eastern and central flanks. The fog seeped into their armour, and turned their flesh to sludge. The fog washed harmlessly over the Augurs and citizens of Ostium, affecting only the Entombed. The people of Ostium watched in horror as the Entombed fell. Many marines endured the pain in determined silence, but many did not. It is from the witnesses of Ostium that the famous phrase comes, "A man who keeps his silence screams loudest." Eight thousand marines died on Ostium, their geneseed reduced to unrecoverable goop.

Golgothos later learned that the horror of Ostium could have been prevented. Aralex Orannis and his War Scribes had investigated an abandoned Life Bringers research facility, and discovered a repository of data containing details into Entombed genetic structures. Had Aralex known the significance of this find, that the Life Bringers were creating a bioweapon capable of selectively targeting the Entombed, he surely would have warned Golgothos. Golgothos never forgave Aralex for his oversight, and declared the War Scribes nonextant: He would treat them as if they did not exist. Forever onward, when the Entombed fought alongside the War Scribes, they would fire their artillery indiscriminately, plan their assaults as if they had no allies, and lend no support. As far as Golgothos was concerned, the War Scribes had ceased to be.

Post-Heresy

Golgothos swore bloody vengeance against Johannes Vrach, primarch of the Life Bringers. Together with his close friend Gaspard Lumey and with the help of the Scale Bearers first company, he assaulted the Life Bringer homeworld of Rai. When they knew they could not win the battle, the Life Bringers destroyed Rai and fled into the Eye of Terror. Unwilling to let Johannes Vrach escape, Golgothos gathered 100 of his venerable dreadnoughts and charged into the Eye of Terror. Golgothos and his men travel from world to world, constantly chasing after Johannes. The Dreadnought and the Daemon Prince have fought countless times, usually resulting in grievous wounds to Johannes, but he always manages to survive.

Centuries later, in M35, The Entombed battled the Life Bringers on the hive world of Mortis III. As the battle raged, Johannes Vrach appeared, and slaughtered Entombed by the score. When all hope seemed lost, a terrible warp storm tore the sky asunder, and from it screamed Golgothos and his Venerable Dreadnoughts. The glorious duel shook the planet itself, and in the end, both Primarchs lay dead.