Editing Conquest of Galaspar (section)

==The Reaper's Harvest==

Mortarion, understanding that the Order could and would sacrifice Protarkos to destroy his forces, swiftly improvised a new battle plan. A ten-man kill team would climb the exterior of the hive and breach the command center from the top, where its rockcrete shield was thinnest, while the remainder of the assault force would descend to the plains outside the city and hold off the Order's reinforcements as long as possible. He wanted to lead the kill team personally, but understood that he would be needed where the threat was greatest. The enemy army outnumbered the remaining Death Guard a hundred to one, and it had enough tanks to be a danger to his sons. He instead tasked Battle-Captain Vallian Tersus of the Seventh Company to lead the team, while he descended to the plains. This was a personal disappointment to Mortarion, as he had wanted to substitute his lost triumph on Barbarus for the successful destruction of the Order's leaders in their fastness, but he subordinated his anger to the exigencies of the campaign.

The Order's tanks began firing on the advancing Death Guard as they emerged from the rubble of Protarkos. The Astartes countered with rad and phosphex. Hundreds of soldiers died quickly and painfully, the flesh sloughing from their bones as the concentrated radiation stewed them alive inside their tanks and rad suits. Hundreds more were devoured by phosphex bombs as the creeping green death ate its way across the field. The Order's generals bombarded the area indiscriminately, sacrificing their own troops and armour to destroy the Death Guard. Mortarion in turn allowed his force to be deliberately encircled, then ordered his Astartes to lance out into the encroaching enemy. Though the tactic briefly caught the Order off guard, they continued their saturation bombardment, content to kill as many of their own as it took to wipe out the Death Guard. Mortarion recognized that the battle now hinged upon whether his kill team could silence the Order's planetary batteries. 

The kill team was scaling Protarkos as the hive's defensive batteries attempted to kill them. One by one, they were swept from the hive's walls, including Battle-Captain Tersus. One of the two survivors was Legionary [[Knights-Errant#Nathaniel Garro|Nathaniel Garro]], who breached the command center's rockcrete shield and took the High Comptrollers prisoner. The fall of the command center silenced the planetary batteries that had been holding the Death Guard fleet at bay, allowing Mortarion to call in an orbital bombardment. The bombardment devastated the Order's army. With their morale shattered, the survivors attempted to retreat, only to be caught between an incoming [[Steel Rain|drop pod assault]] and the vengeful remainder of Mortarion's forces. They were swiftly exterminated, and the rest of the XIV Legion's forces began landing on Galaspar. 

With their armies destroyed, several of the major cities attempted to surrender. Their spokesman was Acting High Comptroller Schyalla Vecchiaz of Peitharchia, who asked Mortarion what his terms of surrender would be. He informed her that no terms would be given and no surrender accepted, and made good on his word. Every overseer, soldier, functionary, and Comptroller on Galaspar was purged to the last, their corpses heaped in great mounds outside the cities they had once dominated. A few were kept alive long enough to be executed in front of or by the slaves. Mortarion ordered the newly liberated slaves to tally the Order's dead, in order to understand the full measure of their freedom, before departing from Galaspar.