Editing Vraks (section)

=== Phase Two: The Noose Tightens ===
Seven years after the invasion, the Imperial army was still stalled at the second defense line when reports of renegade Space Marines assisting the defenders started filtering in. It eventually emerged that Mamon was an [[Alpha Legion]] spy and had called for backup. Cardinal Xaphan was probably no longer even pretending to serve the Emperor when he signed them up for his crusade. Anyway, two years later, the Imperial army got some more line korps, and to everyone's surprise [[Azrael]] showed up with half the [[Dark Angels]] in tow as well. His goals were to smash the heretics' star port (pun intended) to stop them from getting more reinforcements, and to capture Arkos the Faithless, the Alpha Legion's commander on Vraks. They successfully captured and destroyed the star port, but Arkos got away and Azrael was severely wounded in a duel with Arkos, only saved by the intervention of his Interrogator-Chaplain, not to mention pissed. 200 Dark Angels died in that battle.

The success and the new reinforcements led the Imperial commanders to attempt another massed assault. It stalled (again) until Colonel Attas hatched a plan to have his artillery and infantry make a synchronized assault: blast the enemy while his troops crawled up through no-man's-land and then move the bombardment when the infantry was within charging distance - in other words original WW1 Stormtrooper tactics combined with a creeping barrage. Not quite as badass a feat as Tyborc's, but it worked. The second defense line cracked and fell, and the Imperial army was within sight of the Citadel.

Xaphan, having jumped headfirst into heresy by this point, rubbed his hands and cackled with glee, because he knew that the slaughter was only beginning -- he had some more friends on the way.