Editing M43 (section)

==The 2nd Terran Invasion==
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===Overview===
: After centuries, of virtual inactivity, all four of the Chaos Gods perked up when they felt a bit of the Warp recede and empty and boil and contract. The Warp is weird. A hole opened up on the great human planet of Terra. Oh what an opportunity. And to put a nasty daemonic looking cherry on top of evil cake, the tear was in the center of the corpse emperor's castle. One would be sane-insane not seize upon such a grand gift. All four of them aligned tomorrow with the intention of betraying the others yesterday. The Warp is weird. Daemonettes poured through the tear alongside Bloodletters. Such an alliance should have rent asunder any force arrayed against it. But it was not to be. While a tear in the Warp and Materium can be the size of a krak grenade and the size of a planet at the same time, a Webway is fairly stable. So it funneled Chaos down. The Imperium, in time, matched Chaos for sheer diversity of forces. By the climactic end of the war, the guards of the palace included Custodes, Companions, Arbites, Mechanicus forces of all kinds, nearly the whole of the Grey Knights Chapter, the resident Imperial Fists, and a myriad of Inquisitors, their retinues, and equally large diversity of other Astartes contingents.

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: Quickly remembering lessons learned in the Golden Rift War, the defenders of Terra reestablished the old defenses. These were quickly overrun by the tide of daemons. This is what the Golden Rift War could’ve been. The Imperial Fists quickly tasked themselves with setting up a defensive system that would hold for a long time. Longer than the one in the previous war had. It was readily apparent that the Golden Rift War was but a minor incursion by Chaos; this was a full blown invasion. The defenses would have to hold out for decades perhaps even centuries. With that in mind they established three lines of defense: the Eternity line, which was the previous defense line, the Annapurna, which was the edge of the Inner Palace, and the Imperator line which was a flexible but highly armored line draw roughly midline between the Inner and Outer Palace walls.

===The Shattered===
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: Tales of amazing happenings only seem to happen during times of great turmoil or despair. In those excited moments, songs are born and deeds recorded for all of time. The tale of an entity known as The Shattered is a rather well documented phenomena, more so than that of the so-called ‘Legion of the Damned’. It was late in the 901st year of the 42 millenium. The daemons had over taken the Eternity line mere months ago. The Imperium had just started a push to retake the defensive line when a massive surge of Khornate daemons had blunted and turned back their advance. An entire order of Adepta Sororitas, the House of the Fallen Lily, had been paired with the resident Custodes regiment to hold sector 28Y, ubiquitously known as the Pillar Zone. The area containing the Column of Glory was a particularly valuable location as it functioned as a hub and was a large but covered area, perfect for staging. Its value made it a tasty target for the daemons and for the Imperial defenders. 


: Bolter explosions rang out above the cacophony of screeches, roars, shouts, and litanies. The fighting had been particularly brutal this week and no where else was this more evident than the Pillar Zone. It seemed the Battle Sisters and Custodes would hold until a Bloodthirster dropped down from above. The hulking beast of Khorne waded into the fight. The daemons started roaring loader as a swipe of the Bloodthirster’s sword wiped out an entire mission of Sororitas. Then the captain of the Custodes regiment charged in.

	
: “BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD,” the Bloodthirster roared, challenging the lone Custodes that stepped forward. “You dare defile this sacred ground with your taint? I hope that your ‘god’ accepts the blood of his own! FOR THE EMPRAH!” the captain screamed in retort. The daemon swiped downward aiming for the Custodes neck. The captain leaned back and the sword dug itself into the bloodstained floor. The demon stepped into the miss and swung other hand, hoping to gouge his enemy. The Custodes spun his weapon and swung it toward the Khornate. A massive hand pulled back and grabbed the weapon, stopping it before it cut. The daemon grunted in approval, it’s lips curling into a cruel smile. 

	
: “I am Markes Pravian, a Captain of the Adeptus Custodes. Do not think our weapons to be paltry pieces of metal!” Markes pulled the trigger of his Guardian Spear. A bolter round entered the Bloodthirster’s neck and exploded in a shower of blood and viscera. The daemon staggered back from the injury as Markes pulled his Spear into a ‘readied’ stance with several pretty twirls. The daemon turned toward the Captain and snarled right before it started to charge. It swung its sword in a horizontal arc hoping to bisect the Custodes. The agile warrior dodged backward but was unprepared for the next assault. The Bloodthirster carried its momentum and spun around, hitting Markes with a vicious backhand.The strike launched him like an armored missile and he impacted against a hard wall, slumping to the ground. The Bloodthirster approached to finish what it started. “BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!” the daemon roared as it broad its sword down in a execution. The daemonic battle cry was interrupted, “FOR THE EMPEROR!” The massive sword had stopped mid-swing, gripped by an equally massive gauntlet.

	
: The Bloodthirster looked up, following the hand up. The hand connected to a form that could be described as an amalgamation of an Astartes and an Imperial Knight. It matched the daemon in height but severely outclassed it in shear weight. The newcomer threw the sword up and out of the way. Its other hand shot out and into the Bloodthirster’s still stunned face. Markes had regained consciousness just in time to see the giant form of the daemon rocket back, fully suspended in the air and impact a wall. He realized that an Imperial Knight had shown up; he looked up to identify the house. Instead, he saw an Imperial Fist symbol. And then he noticed a White Scars symbol and a Blood Angels icon as well. This was clearly not a knight, it didn’t even look like the ones he’d seen before. As he was looking back, Markes noticed another thing. More accurately, a lack thereof. All the pauldrons on the Column of Glory had disappeared. His reverie was shattered by the blood curdling cry of the Bloodthirster flying back into the fray.

	
: The avatar lurched forward towards the daemon. Before the Bloodthirster could react, a massive hand reached up and grabbed a leg. No matter the fury of the wings, the daemon was hurled downward. A sickening impact, the sound alone was mushy, with interstitial cracks as bones broke. The daemon struggled to get up and regain the offensive. As it kneeled with one hand on a knee, it smirked, ‘it’s enemy was closing the distance’ It swung its sword in a horizontal arc once more, planning to cut off the legs. There was no tortured screeching of metal, only the whoosh of empty air. Its sword was meters away on the ground. The Bloodthirster located it’s sword, looked back at is foe, then back toward its sword. It turned again to the avatar with a grin. A massive fist gripped his face. The avatar had grappled the head of Bloodthirster and set the other massive gauntlet on the shoulder of the daemon. The grin instantaneously turned to anger. “BE PURGED, DAEMON” the short declaration echoed throughout the area. The avatar twisted the head to the right with a sharp crack. And then it reversed its rotation and spun the head nearly three hundred and sixty degrees the other way. Numerous smaller cracks and wet, sloppy tearing could be heard. The daemon’s body sagged as the avatar pressed down on its shoulder. No longer connected by anything with strength, the avatar ripped its gauntlet upward, carrying the head of the Bloodthirster with it. 

	
: By the time of the daemons death, Markes had made it back to his feet. The avatar stomped over to the Captain and looked down at the diminutive Custodes. It dropped the head down next to him. The avatar turned and started walking toward the center of the palace. “FOR THE EMPEROR” sounded through the battlefield as the mysterious giant waded through the daemonic forces. The push of the Khornate forces soon ended and the battle settled back down to its normal self.

===The Death of Kaldor Draigo===
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: Kaldor Draigo, the most famous Grey Knight you’ve never heard of, because let’s face it, if you have seen a Grey Knight, you’re probably dead. Either because they killed you for heresy or they killed you for seeing them. Just like other denizens of the Warp, Draigo heard, felt, tasted the small rift opening in the Imperial Palace. Realizing he could still fight and not violate the stupid curse of never being able to leave the Warp, he packed up and headed toward the hole. In the Imperial Palace, it is confirmed that for exactly 5 days, no daemons came out of The Breach. Inside the Webway, it was for 2 months, if time were to apply, that Kaldor Draigo stood firm in the middle of the tunnel and held. He slew the Keeper of Secrets, Rgion Longw Festariola Grast B’grain Purignaw Nivenwane, 3 times, his Nemesis Pike finding a new weakness in the Slaaneshi Champion every time.
 

: It was Kharn who felled the great Draigo. Understand that this is before the Primarchs travelled to the Breach. The Betrayer had heard of this great fight in the Corpse Hole as it was called. As he marched to face a worthy foe he could see the whirling pike and crackling energy. He could hear the litanies and prayers being screamed. He could taste the blood in the not-air. It got him even more pumped. Kharn shoved aside several daemons and was just about to call out to the loyalist to issue a challenge when he felt a claw on his shoulder. A voice attached to the claw claimed that the Astartes was his and that she was the only one who had the right to fight it. The Keeper of Secrets, Rgion, died a fourth time after Kharn pulped its head against the wall of the failed webway tunnel. 


: The duel between the two champions was grand. Kharn’s chainaxe ground against the stave of Kaldor’s pike. Each combatant jostled for position as they parried each other's strikes. Kharn swung his axe down at Draigo. The Grey Knight twitched his pike to the left a touch and the heavy axe glanced mere inches from Draigo. A twirl and a twist brought the Nemesis Pike around and then into Kharn’s chest. The Khornate champion halted for several seconds, surprised at the injury. His other massive hand reached up and grabbed the pike and pulled it further into his chest. He could feel the purity and light of the pike burning through his tainted flesh. He brought his axe down into the old Astartes neck. The two sagged to the ground, blood spilling everywhere. “Good fight” Kharn muttered. “Likewise” said the Space Marine. The spectating daemons crept forward, in order to avoid either of the fighters killing them. Neither got up, so the daemons surged through the Breach once more.

[[Category:Stories]][[Category:Stories/Warhammer 40,000]]