Editing Setting:Brighthammer 40,000/Lords of Order (section)

== The Initiates of Order ==

The Initiates of Order were originally formed as a warrior brotherhood during the final war on Itza.
Following the sealing of the Old Ones, the sacrifice of Gork and Mork, the death of Lord Kroak, and the still raging war in the Warp, the initiates traveled the galaxy, to bolster the Lords of Order by rebuilding the galaxy with hope instead of harm in their minds.

Never numerous, the Initiates started a massive recruitment drive during and after humanity's war with the Iron Men and the Age of Strife (which were both caused by the Universal Destroyer's death throes).
Over the following centuries, they established a central authority and a unified government.

When the warp storms that followed the death of the Destroyer finally ceased, the Adepts of Unified Order began an aggressive program of expansion, all the while cleaning their ranks of pacifist and xeno elements.
After unifying a third of the Galaxy, the Adepts came to blows with the newly founded Imperium of Man in a conflict that lasted millennia.

Now dubbed the "Great Crusade" by Imperial history, the conflict officially began when the Imperium was declared a heretical warping of the old Terran Alliance by the Archadept, although there had been brief flashes of conflict before.
Consequentially, the Adepts began to cleanse all imperial planets of "heretical" life-forms. Appalled by the mass-slaughter, a minor faction split from the Adepts and joined the Imperium, which had already begun a massive counter-attack over one hundred and twenty solar systems.

Due to the heavy losses of Adept fanatics, the very Gods of Order were beginning to swell with their souls and began to turn into oppressive tyrants.  When the first attack of the corrupted Gods of Order froze an entire solar system in a crystalline husk, some the Primarchs under the leadership of Horus, committed ritual suicide to join with the Gods of Order and counteract their corruption.

In the end, the Imperium proved victorious and the Adepts were destroyed, with the emperor personally slaying the Archadept.

Any Adept troops who surrendered were granted full pardon, and most of the joined the Imperial's Initiates.
Today's Initiates of Order are one of the Imperium's sanctioned religions, and among the first to spread Imperial influence and thoughts on non-imperial worlds. However, no central unified structure exists anymore, and is strongly discouraged.

[[Category:Brighthammer|Lords of Order]]