Editing The Birth of Xenobane (section)

==The Fury of Xenobane==
The Fury of Xenobane

Planet Metal Key was an anomaly that served armory world dating back to the dusk of the Great Crusade. According to Imperial records all psykers that set foot on this world turned into Chaos Spawn in mere hours and as such Pariahs served as the occupants shortly after it was claimed by Corvus Glaive of the Raven Guard. Millennia past, Metal Key was used as a secret outpost that doubled for both the Raven Guard and the Officio Assassinorium. At least once every two centuries the planet would be assaulted by all types of Eldar, Greenskins, or Chaos forces, the worst of these occurring in the mid thirty-sixth millennium when the Brotherhood of Dust led a daemon host, nearly conquering the planet if not for intervention from the White Scars and dozens of Imperial Knights and Titans. Since then Metal Key has often used reserves of various Knights and Titans to secure the planet's main fortress and the dark secret lurking beneath the surface. The most powerful weapon in the Imperium's arsenal for this forest world is a Warmonger-class Imperator Titan that was said to have decimated an entire Ork WAAAGH in the thirty ninth millennium under two minutes.

The Forge and various Chaos Space Marine chapters have found Metal Key as a prized area of interest for both its mysterious subterranean secret and its massive arsenal of Knights, Titans, Tanks, and other vehicles that would prove useful. Since the Despoiler's Eighth Black Crusade the ground of Metal Key frequently glowed with subtle amounts of psychic energy that have caught the attention of Chaos Daemons and the Thousand Sons. After dozens of centuries of failure the Forge of Souls offered to lend its Soul Grinders to a strike force composed of the Night Lords, Iron Warriors, the Wolves of Horus, the Brotherhood of Dust, and the Daggerfangs. Sacrifices of slaves and chants were executed to get the entire strike force to appear on Metal Key, but eventually portals opened the door to war.

The forests surrounding Metal Key's main fortress were filled with the heretical astartes and their Neverborn allies. The Imperial officers that first noticed their approach quickly alerted their superiors. In mere minutes hundreds of guardsmen and tanks were deployed onto the battlefield as plasma, flamer, and bolter turrets lined the forty-plus meter walls. The first wave composed entirely of possessed from the Ry-Vius attack and Chaos Spawn, the mindless monsters charged into the turrets with mindless fury, most of them dying before even being able to damage the wall. The Brotherhood of Dust noted the significant increase in power of their sorcerers and Rubric Marines and as such began to execute long ranged assaults of psychic energy on the tank battalions. The Iron Warriors supported them with their anti-armor weaponry and the handful of Chaos Rhinos they were able to bring with them.

The Assassins were called in, all pariahs and totaled fifty in number. Each one used secret underground passages and emerged from the forest in an attempt to ambush the sorcerers. This is where the Night Lords came in, holding the Assassins back and cutting them off from their object via guerilla warfare. The Wolves of Horus and Daggerfangs were tasked with sniping the Guardsmen and turrets that lined the walls. Twenty minutes passed before the Knights were summoned into action and as such the Soul Grinders were quick to appear from their hiding spots and charged into the valorous armored machines. The Knights and the Soul Grinders exchanged long range blows, neither side successfully downing the other.

It was at that moment the Forge's hateful champion appeared. Like thunder, Xenobane stormed toward the tank battalions, charging and knocking each one over with little effort. His now wraithbone-laced sword easily sliced through them like a hot knife through meat. It was at this moment the Iron Warriors aided in the destruction of the fortress walls, the Chaos Spawn and Possessed were wiped out by the Guardsmen. Plasma and Rockets littered the sky as a hole in the wall was eventually created upon the structure's collapse. Xenobane had no need for this as he rushed up and over the walls, charging like a bull and leaping to its top. The troopers were caught off guard at something so gargantuan and were easily slaughtered as they tried to fire their lasguns. Panic began to spread among the first line of defense before the Titans were called in.

At the same time the Assassins carried out their mission, successfully killing each Night Lord and Dust Brother thanks to their training and weapons, but without the cost of lost a fifth of their force. They steathfully followed the Wolves of Horus, Iron Warriors, and Daggerfangs who had begun to raid the inside of the fortress walls. The Titans emerged from their hangers composing of Warhounds, Reavers, Warbringers, and Warlords to aid the Knights. Soul Grinders kept charging from the opened portals to even the odds, but the god-machines proved to strong as slowly one by one the Emperor's will seemed to have blessed them with victory in their favor.

Minutes passed, the Assassins pinned the coalition of Chaos Space Marines as they finished sweeping the area of imperial soldiers. Xenobane took note of the conflict and charged at the pariahs. The Assassins believed that no Chaos Daemon could harm them as they had permanently destroyed hundreds before. However, Xenobane proved to be different as the Shining Impact, now laced with wraithbone, easily sliced through twenty of them in one strike. The remaining Assassins were baffled by how this happened, leaving them open to intense bolter and plasma fire. The remaining Daggerfangs charged toward them with chainswords and chainaxes, most of them not surviving before landing their blows.

Xenobane swung his unholy blade of hate once more after the now decimated legion took five assassins with them, adding ten more to his own kill count. The remaining five fell back, the Wolves of Horus pursued to finish the job. However, the battle was not over as every Knight and Reaver was called in to open fire on the Chaos invaders that penetrated the fortress. Xenobane was struck heavily in the back from the sudden assault, the Iron Warriors lost their last Chaos Rhinos in the chaotic ambush. However, the Empyrean beast recovered long enough to charge directly at them with near lightning speed.

The Goliath Buster fired, quickly destroying every Knight that didn't erect their void shields in time. The Damned Magma quickly damaged the Reavers as the abomination quickly followed up with one Star Strike to immobile and for most destroy the god-machines. The Holocaust Erupter fired, far longer and with more fury than in previous battles, whittling down the bewildered pilots as to how they were being damaged so fast. The Iron Warriors aided the Soul Grinder by aiming for the leg joints and hips of their foes to knock them off balance.

Word of this massacre reached the channel of the Warhonds, Reavers, and Warbringers as the Soul Grinders began to advance further despite their losses. It was at this point that the Warmonger had to be summoned, the crew boarded the hulking machine and the underground lift used to store it erected the fifty meter machine to the battlefield. Missiles, rockets, shells, plasma, fire, these were all fired in one giant succession against the Soul Grinder incursion.With one decisive barrage the invaders were obliterated back into the Warp, a sense of hope rained across the humans as they took to heart how their Emperor protected them. Xenobane and the remaining Chaos Marines heard and felt the tremors of the attack.

The smaller Titans began to charge into the hole in the wall to finish off the remaining invaders as the Warmonger slowly turned its frame to fire upon the area if the need every arose. It was at this moment that the ground began to glow, radiate with psychic energy. Xenobane felt this power and decided to channel as much of it into it as the raging Daemon could via his warpsword. The mysterious anomaly responded to this in an unpredictable way. In a manner most horrifying, the energy, almost as if it was alive, began to slowly grow Xenobane in size. As the Titans arrived, the mighty Neverborn used the Shining Impact to completely annihilate every Warhound and Reaver that got near him. He kept growing as the survivors in the Warbringers began to open fire before his size maxed out at sixty meters. Their blows damaged it, but not enough to down him as three swings of his swords cut the mechanical foes down with little effort. Xenobane emerged to challenge the Warmonger, causing much of the crew to feel a sense of intense dread running through their veins.

The Warmonger opened fire, Xenobane slowly walked forward as the Goliath Buster's shield deflected the physical projectiles although the plasma shots slowed him down. In close combat both giants engaged in melee, the Warmonger swung its weapons while still firing secondary weapons as Xenobane thrashed the wraithbone-enfused Shining Impact and crashed with the Goliath Buster without launching it. Mighty blows exchanged for each one, in this fire of rage they tried to break each other down.

Inside the fortress the remaining Iron Warriors attempted to investigate the mysterious chasm when a portal opened from the Warp in their bath. The other side had two Blue Horrors on a disc with a large grimoire floating down the path while on their side had a Lord of Change stop them. This avian scheme was the infamous Aetaos'rau'keres, he stopped and proclaimed that they needed to walk away and say nothing of what transpired. The heralds, unbeknownst to them, were the legendary Blue Scribes P'tarix and Xirat'p, sent by their master to collect his consciousness's many pieces throughout the material plane. The mysterious force is revealed to be none other than one of these pieces that separated during the transition between the Age of Technology and the Age of Strife. The Blue Scribes quickly transcribed the piece and all of its power under a minute, allowing them and their escort to return to the Immaterium before any Imperial force could catch them in the act.

Outside, Xenobane noticed his power began to quickly wane and the Warmonger exploited this by easily smacking him around. Battered and damaged, the Soul Grinder quickly realized it would soon be banished as even it could not handle an Imperator-class Titan despite the damage he gave it. The colossal machination attempted to stomp on it, but Xenobane used his Shining Impact penetrate the Titan's foot as it came crashing onto it.

One loud, almost suicidal bellow echoed in the Warmonger's frame as warp lightning began to radiate through the inner circuitry and pulsed through the crew, killing them instantly. The beast managed to break out of the Titan's left foot by slamming through the ankle.

It was weakened. It was heavily damaged. It was exhausted. It was barely able to stand. Xenobane was almost vanquished, but was finally able to survive and win against the Imperium's onslaught. Or so it would seem.

The five remaining assassins slowly approached the tired Daemon, about to expunge its existence. The Wolves of Horus slowly encroached behind them, waiting to strike as well. Xenobane was in real danger of being permanently snuffed out. However, without warning, the Iron Warriors unloaded their barrage from afar, fighting off the Assassins. The Wolves of Horus outflanked them seconds later. The pariahs tried fighting off the heretics on both sides to little avail. Before long the Assassins managed to out maneuver and take down the remaining Wolves of Horus, but lost two in the process. The Iron Warriors gave one last fearless charge that took down two of them, leaving only one assassin alive. This final assassin attempted to flee only for Xenobane to grab the individual with the Goliath Buster and crush them to a bloody pulp, killing the final foe instantly.

Metal Key had now fallen to Chaos. Daemons were summoned to convert the planet into a Daemon World. The supplies and weaponry belonged solely to the Iron Warriors and their successors. While they no longer had their anomaly, the legion was able to repair and defile the many Tanks, Knights, and Titans including the Warmonger as the planet succumbed to the reality unraveling the Warp had to offer. Xenobane returned to its home with many imperial souls and another triumph. Before the Forge of Souls allowed the terror to rest he was told he would be needed again for an invasion the Death Guard are preparing in the Konor System.