Editing Cardinal Knights (section)

== Chapter Leaders ==
[[File:Chaptermastercardinalknights.png|360px|thumb|right|Puro Corazón ]]
=== Master of Sanctity, Chapter Master Puro Corazón, Heart Taker ===
Puro Corazón has served as both Chapter Master and Master of Sanctity for the Cardinal Knights for almost 400 years. He is their 9th chapter Master. However, the events that have led to his entitlement as Master of the Chapter is not one most would hope to experience, and he has not so much led his chapter for 400 years as much as been a part of it.

The son of a holy man in his tribe, whose name he does not remember, upon being taken by Cardinal Knights he had the honour of being chosen by the warriors of the Emperor. His faith and righteousness were quickly determined, and the Master of Sanctity took the fresh Puro under his wing, teaching himthe ways of the Chapter, their rituals and practices, oaths of fury and purity, and most importantly the rites of burial and ritual embalming and mummification of fallen brothers. He learned quickly and by the time he was a full fledged brother and Chaplain the Master of Sanctity had named him as Successor.

Corazón served as the Master of Sanctity for a century under the Head Librarian and Chapter Master Alma Escura, who he greatly respected. However, such was not to last. He watched as Alma Escura grew rather strange and distant, seemingly leading his Chapter to many great victories and yet isolating himself further and further. Corazón grew suspicious and began to investigate both his Chapter Master and the Chapter's long string of victories. It was not long before he realized the terrible truth, something he had thought was true in his gut for a long time now... Alma Escura was a servant of Khorne.

At the Great Celebration Corazón finally brought his evidence forward, accusing Alma Escura of heresy and declaring him a traitor to the Emperor before the assembled Chapter. As the battle of the celebration began his suspicions were confirmed when Escura became a Daemon Prince before his very eyes. The two dueled for a short time, and were it not for the device Corazón's compatriots had created he would have lost. In the end, Escura was slain by his hand, and Corazón took the heart of the foul Daemon into his own chest, in order to trap the foul creature in this realm in a cage of piety and purity. 

Now the heart is both his maintainer and his destroyer, giving him great power at the cost of destroying his body as it cannot corrupt his soul. Ensconced in his great Sarcophagus, he now fights its corrupting influence every day.

The Master of Sanctity has since been placed on life support in a Dreadnought specifically designed to assist in the extraction of the hearts of enemies. Though he is in a state of deactivation most of the time, during brutal campaigns the Chapter Master is awakened so that he may wreak havoc in the name of the Emperor, satiate his heart's desire for blood, and suppress the horrible pain within him.

=== Urbanus "Rage Maul" Tragar, 3rd Company Librarian Captain ===
Fundamentalist Knight, tends to run very hot and cold. Is seemingly restrained most of the time, but is also known for the reckless abandon with which he wades into the enemy. Was notable for being on the fence when it came to the internal clash between Escura and Corazon. The close-knit loyalty he has over his Astartes and the sway he holds over other companies has had him under close observation by those captains wishing for reform.

In an engagement against an Ork warboss, his Crozius' maul was shattered and in a fit of rage, he proceeded to beat the greenskin to death with the broken instrument and finished it off by jamming the splintered stump into the beast's bloated throat.

Those under his command rarely, if ever, bother to question his directives - the moment they set foot on the battlefield, they rush the enemy with chainswords in hand. The hearts of those they attempt to claim are often far too damaged to be of any use.

[[File:Chaplaincardinalknight.jpg|270px|thumb|left|Threld Grislom]]

=== Threld Grislom, "The War Hearts" 4th Company Chaplain Captain ===
In these difficult times of being without an active Master of Sanctity many of the companies have began to devolve into berserker tactics in order to satisfy their bloodlust and take more hearts from worthy enemies; while some have found success with this other companies have began to suffer more casualties than usual in their pursuit of powerful hearts. The original Captain of the 4th company, Librarian Captain Solomar Caldius, led the company through many pursuits of powerful Ork hearts. During one of his crusades against an Ork colony the company was ambushed and flanked from the south by a squad of Ork meks. Rather than attempting to destroy the meks Captain Solomar saw opportunity to acquire more powerful Ork hearts. He rallied many of the marines near him and sent them with him on a zealous charge on the largest mek in the Ork squad. Threld, serving as his company's Champion at the time, was left to defend him and his marine brothers against the flank to the north.

It was a savage fight, with many casualties suffered as they were outnumbered by the Ork shootas . Threld and the surviving marines regrouped and looked to the south to see that Captain Solomar and the men he led in the charge had either been killed or broken ranks. The Ork Mekz now had no other target than Threld and his men. It was clear that the Orkz hadn’t come out of the battle undamaged; many of their squads lacked men and their meks showed signs of damage. As the largest Ork Mek approached Threld could see Solomar’s body hanging from a piece of metal on the Mek. Faced with this threat Threld acted quickly: leaving no time for his marine brothers to panic he began ordering them into positions and to prepare to defend to the last man. The Ork horde approached and he shouted to his brothers “Hold! Remember! Their flesh is weak! They merely shell themselves with metal, but our hearts beat with it! They may have warmachines, but remember brothers, we have the purity of the machine WITHIN US! TRUST IN YOUR MECHANICAL BEATING AND IT WILL NEVER FALTER!” The ensuing fight was carnage. The Ork infantry never seemed to thin as the Cardinal Knights fired at them with their bolter pistols. Eventually the Orkz were in charging range. Threld stood in the middle of his men, covering the front lines with Bolter Rifle fire, as they met the Ork stampede, their powerfists and chainswords plunging into green flesh.  By the end only a handful of Ork stragglers remained. Most of the company had been defeated in the fight but the most hardened of the men still stood. Threld looked around the dead Marines, and then to the dead Captain’s body. He walked over to it and with his powerfist extracted Solomar Caldius’ original heart. In that moment Threld despised the man for destroying the company, but he knew that Solomar was regardless a great warrior and had taken many hearts in the field. Threld was made Chaplain Captain since he was the highest ranked survivor and put Solomar’s heart in his chest, as a way to honor the Company's past.

Once he was officially the leader of company he learned just how widespread the devolution of the Chapter was. Many Companies' losses were unacceptably high. Threld decided he would be apart of the reformation to save the chapter from wiping itself out with ineffective and overzealous tactics. He was one of the first Captains to begin asserting himself to his company as their true commanding officer, in order to build morale and a better company attitude. Quickly he took the 4th company from zealous suicidal berserkers to well=disciplined disciples of the machine. He appointed much of his command squad from the survivors of Solomar’s defeat; titled the “The Black Hearts” each of his command squad is trained to hold ranks among the mean and act as subcaptains during battle.

=== Chief Apothecary Sangue, the Old Ultra ===
A patchwork man of exceptional age with a visage both afflicted and afflicting. He lost his left arm to an androgynous Slaaneshi warrior. His left arm now stops at the elbow and splits of into 4 mechandrites: one has tweezers, one has scalpels, one has a stitching machine and the other has a syringe and various types of anesthetic.

Orks ate his feet and everything from the knees down. He now has artificial talons that often remind people of Chaos Assault Marines but also too often bring to mind a large mechanical chicken.

He lost half his face to a lucky enemy shot in an otherwise unremarkable civil uprising; he now has an artificial eye and ear. After about thirty years he added another cybernetic eye above the first one to enhance his visual capability; he can now see into the ultraviolet and infrared spectrums, although extended periods of time with this mode engaged generally result in a headache. The ear has a built in radio.

A Dark Eldar with a shatter cannon fucked up the contents of his ribcage to the point where the other apothecaries decided it would be easier to just scoop the soup out and put some prosthetics in. He kept his trophy heart, heirloom of a previous hero. It was and is in good working condition and needed little surgery to repair it. It has beat for over 3,000 years and will hopefully beat for 3,000 more.

He keeps good care of his heart. The best way of keeping good care of it was to keep it out of his chest when they put him back together. It is in a diamond-glass jar with a miniature life support system. He keeps it on his desk. It freaks out visitors, as is almost certainly the intention.

3,000 years of an ungentle life has resulted in all of his bones now being reinforced with adamantium to patch them back up. All his teeth are ceramic implants of varying age. 

What of the original components of the man remains at this point is unknown. There is an in-chapter joke amongst the knights; "if it's not metal it's probably drugs". Old Ultra is rather fond of performance enhancing substances. His flesh is old and tired and his cybernetics are of varying age and design built by generations of tech-marines and don't all fit together exactly 100%.
The drugs make up the difference-- a bit.

He doesn't need them, he just really, really likes them.

=== Captain Cyprian Megalos ===
He was once looked down upon by many in the chapter because his mother was one of the city-born and a shopkeeper. His father was a path-finder of one of the more approachable tribes that would often trade animal skins and meat for the produce of civilization. Despite being the result of a shopkeeper and a tribe that barely remembered what war even was Cyprian Megalos is undoubtedly one of the worst nightmares the Cardinal Knights have ever inflicted upon the galaxy.

He is word-perfect in the chapter scripture, the Thorian Creed, the chants of the Scutum–Centaurus death faith and a hundred other blood-drenched holy books.

His presence on the field of war has been likened unto a wrecking ball attached to a meat grinder covered in thermite. He is a baneblade that walks like a man and has hymns for engine noise. And he sings, by Him on Earth he sings. With the voice of angels and the majesty of the old gods he sings. He has a face that looks like it was set on fire and put out with a cricket bat and from it issues forth a voice in song that would make the heavens weep. Drenched in red and smoking with the blood of the fallen he yet stands immaculate in the eyes of his brothers and the mere mortals beneath him.

He is the voice of faith within the chapter; there are no other chaplains that are too proud to ask his interpretation on holy writ. He is, in a real way, a chaplain's chaplain.

He strides into war with his old and much repaired plasma pistol in one had and a Crozius Arcanum in the other. That Crozius has taken more daemons than most Nobles of Ashardalon have had hot meals. The last thing in the material world all too many of the never-born see before being sent back to their hell is the winged Sanguinius that makes up its head. Possibly there are daemons now following him, intentionally seeking him out with the intention of settling the score. He wouldn't know. They all look the same to him.

=== Rhydian the Vartanian, "Master of Ceremony" 9th Company Captain-Maintainer  ===

The Cardinal Knights 9th company consists of additional Chaplains, Librarians and Apothecaries, replacing the usual Devastator company. Rarely operating as a stand-alone company, its Marines are spread among other companies. The Captain-Maintainer is responsible for the protection of the traditions of the chapter.

Rhydian the Vartanian was, back in the old days, apprenticed to one of the shamans of his tribe out on the ice. His particular tribe was one of the non-nomadic ones that dwelt around the hot springs of the far, far north. Vartan was the name of his tribe. Rhydian is the last of the Vartanians; the tribe, as an identity, died out about 300 years ago. A whole bunch of them migrated southwards to find a new life and a bunch of mammoth herders moved in to the vacated space. The cultures hybridized and now they are the Kalathan tribe.

His discovery was not dramatic. The tribe, as was their custom, sent out a messenger to say that another psyker had been born. The Knights sent an apothecary and one of their own psykers to examine the boy. Discovering that he was indeed psychic and also free of additional mutations and such he was taken by the Chapter for training.

Since his discovery he has gone forth and done great things.

His actual raw power is not actually that great; mostly it just manifests as an uncanny gut feeling and some low to mid level telekinesis. Instead he relies on cunning and underhanded tricks many Astartes would consider dishonorable.

He is word-perfect in chapter scripture but mostly uses this talent to make snarky and borderline irreverent comments on his fellow captains and the Chaplains.

Despite his not particularly impressive abilities for a Librarian, he is of the belief that psychics are the true inheritors of humanity and that the psyker master race will become dominant in time. It's not a view that wins him many friends.

His trophy heart he took from a Tyrannid of the Lictor group. It itches when tyranids are close.