Editing Iron Guard (section)

= History =

== Pre-Primarch history and reunion==

Created along with its brother Legions during the latter days of the Unification Wars, the XIIth Legion would find its origins in those peoples of Terra that bowed to the nascent Imperium of their own accord. As gift to their new liege, the various warlords and generals gave their sons to form the basis from one of his armies of gene-enhanced warriors. Compared to the preceding Tenth Legion, the stability of the Twelfth would prove exceptionally stable in those early days, with little deviance from the Standard Pattern. As an experiment on the Imperium's part, new psycho-indoctrination techniques were introduced, aiming to increase the warriors' efficiency by inducing a drive towards total war doctrines: anything less than complete eradication of the enemy would be seen as unsufficient in the new legion's eyes.

The first recorded deployment of the XII Legion as a self-sufficient entity would be the Compliance of Sotho, which would pave the way for the later conquest of Sa'afrik. There, three thousand Astartes fought against twenty times their number of irregulars and mercenaries gold-sworn to the Oligarchs of Sa'afrik in rad-swept plains. The campaign would be one of skirmishes in small settlements as the wasteland offered no useful cover. From town to town, the legion would hunt its prey and deliver a heavy decapitating strike before cutting down those who fled. No prisoner was taken, no survivor tolerated. To this day, the only accounts that remain from the Sotho Compliance hail from the Imperium, as no opponent was left to testify.

===Rise of the Iron General===

When the infant Primarchs were scattered through the stars, the one bearing the numeration XII would land on a world whose original name has been lost to history. Fragmentary records render it as either Dherzel or Tarzhalas. The planet had suffered heavily from infighting during Old Night, having reached its electrical revolution mere decades before the Primarch landed. This industrialisation had been led by a feudal system, whose various houses had united to conserve their power into a global High Kingdom. However efficient this system had been for the development of technology, it thrived off the blood of the poor, and many voices rose against it. In remote mountainous areas, the people had rejected the oppressive rule of the High Kingdom, calling themselves Liberated Zones. An uprising was inevitable. It was in one such free zone that the young primarch would land.

His arrival would be seen as an omen that the time was right. He was named Zelbezis, a name pre-dating the rise of the High Kingdom, and held as a sign that the time was right. He soon showed prestigious abilities to learn, and he was taught in all matters of war and statecraft. From siegecraft to guerilla, from dialectics to cryptography, from gunsmithing to the arts of the blade, he was to be the perfect revolutionary. His very first raids against the High Kingdom's, railway sabotage and warehouse pillagings, were flawless, and he soon rose to coordination roles. It was around this time he took the nom de guerre of "Dyestes".

==The Great Crusade==

==Brotherwar==

==Post-Brotherwar==