Editing The Great Sowing (section)

===The Ifrits vs Silver Cataphracts===
<blockquote>''"ARRRRRGHBURGLEMURGLEBURGLEMURGLE!!!"''</blockquote>
-Ali Busman, on entering the Land Raider

The spectacular failure of an Imperial Guard regiment and two Space Marine chapters forced Administratum to reassess the threat the Green Men posed to the Imperium. Although Durnovarian Subsector was already as good as lost, many lords feared that Galen wouldn't stop at conquering it. They needed a way to put an end to his campaign of terror for good, and to these ends they chose a Chapter with a reputation for getting things done: the [[Silver Cataphracts]]. With their characteristic grumbling about Administratum incompetents pitting them against a mere warband, the sons of [[Alexandri of Rosskar|Alexandri]] set course for Durnovaria. 

Their first clash with the enemy forces in the subsector was bound to be spectacular, for it was the Ifrits they were facing off against. While Silver Cataphracts had a well-deserved reputation for stopping the enemy whatever the cost, the Ifrits were infamous for being completely unstoppable, no matter the circumstances. On several documented occasions, their Berzerkers kept fighting for several minutes with their heads severed, and it was a popular joke amongst the Ghastly Talons that even if you vaporised an Ifrit's body with a meltagun, his head would still keep rolling at you with a chainaxe clenched in its teeth. Although they were numerically inferior to the Silver Cataphracts and possessed virtually no vehicles due to their tendency to smash the controls in random bouts of rage, they were still eager to face this challenge, even if it were to be their last.

Although the sons of Rosskar initially considered this foe a minor obstacle on their way to the Green Men, their first confrontation on the glacier world of Digranes taught them not to underestimate these reckless warriors. Employing their usual tactics, they sent a throng of tanks against the Ifrits in a bid to quickly vanquish the enemy and move on with the subsector's cleansing. The tank drivers laughed as they saw a disorganised horde of Traitor marines running at them, swinging their chainaxes and shouting incomprehensible insults about their mothers. 

Although the vast majority of the Ifrits were slain on their way to the tanks, by some inexplicable luck a lone Chaos Marine by the name of Ali Busman somehow managed to get to a Land Raider, completely unnoticed in the clouds of smoke caused by all the explosions across the battlefield. Seeing Space Marines cower in a metal box like a bunch of cowards drove him to a raving fury, and so he started methodically chipping at the armoured goliath with his chainaxe. Understandably, the poor weapon broke fairly soon, but this did little to diminish Ali's anger as he started pounding the tank with his fists. Eventually the strange sounds coming from the outside picked the curiosity of the tank's crew, and so they sent one of their number outside to check what was going on. As soon as he opened the hatch, Busman leaped at him, choked him to death and bit his nose off for a good measure. When their lookout man failed to return, the tank's commander sent another one, already starting to worry about the situation. This one was similarly choked by the Ifrit. Instead of waiting for his enemies to come out one by one, Ali picked the chainsword of one of his victims, jumped into the hatch and quickly slaughtered the rest of the crew.

He was now out of things to kill and his murderlust was far from being satisfied, so he started smashing the interiors of the command deck. Eventually, the damage he had caused made the Machine Spirit go insane. The tank suddenly started driving in circles and shooting in all directions, running over countless Silver Cataphracts and Ifrits as well as randomly destroying two Predators employed by the Loyalists. It took the Silver Cataphracts a bit of time to figure out what the hell was going on, but once they established what exactly had happened, they ordered all of their forces in the vicinity to bring the rogue Land Raider down at any cost. After losing several more lives to its madness, they finally managed to explode the insane tank. Miraculously, Ali Busman was almost completely unharmed by the explosion. Thrown no less than ten metres away by the shockwave, he immediately got back on his feet, picked up an abandoned chainsword and got back in the fray.

Even though this battle was an unexpected success for the Ifrits, they were still pretty much doomed against the far superior Silver Cataphracts. Having seen how powerless vehicles are against the logic-defying Ifrits, the Chapter's force commander decided to field mostly troops against them in their second major confrontation. The warband's leader Mahmud Rubin was delighted by this turn of events and decided to try out a thing he had long been thinking about. At his command, his remaining warriors drenched themselves in prometium and set themselves on fire before charging at the enemy. Impressed by the recklessness of this feat, Khorne temporarily made the Ifrits impervious to the fire that danced on their power armour, making them virtually unstoppable in close combat. Guided by blind fury alone, Rubin and his closest followers somehow managed to cut their way through the enemy ranks right into their rear area, where they found the Thunderhawks used by the Silver Cataphracts for transportation. After a brief discussion, the Ifrits decided that Silver Cataphracts were far too amusing of an opponent to slaughter them entirely on that day. Therefore, they spontaneously decided to flee the planet and give their enemies an opportunity to get their act together before they meet again. They then hijacked the Thunderhawks and rapidly skedaddled, leaving the Silver Cataphracts completely befuddled, not to mention stuck in a frozen desert with no transports. 

Although the bizarre showdown with the Ifrits left a bad taste in the mouth of the sons of Alexandri, they were at the very least satisfied that they were now free to move on to their primary objective, the Green Men. Alas, it was too late: considering his mission done, Galen ordered his warhost to withdraw from Durnovarian Subsector and return to the Eye of Terror. But even though the campaign was a disaster for the Imperium, the analysis of the data obtained during it prepared Humanity for much greater incursions that were to soon follow.