Richter Kless
"They call me a traitor, yet I know I am constant. “Heretic”, they cried. Yet I have seen the Gods in a way they cannot… I know the greatness of the Elder Races that came before them and the unimaginable divinity of the creatures that came before that…"
- – this poor bastard
Richter Kless was one of Warhammer Fantasy's greatest human scholars and theologians, a man so capable and erudite that the Cult of Sigmar unofficially commissioned him to research the Ruinous Powers, so that the faithful may be better fight their corruption. Whether the task was forced upon him, or he undertook it by his own volition, Kless had much more success in this study than likely the many others before (and after) him did, but as we all know, no-one gets away completely unharmed from the attention of the Dark Gods. While surprisingly all of them allowed him his research and the maglignant energies didn't mutate his body at all, the man ultimately ended up little more than a mumbling mess when he came back, but he had completed his magnum opus: the Liber Chaotica, a collection of five tomes that sought to explain the madness that is the many facets of Chaos, collating and documenting the innumerable forces of the Great Enemy, while at the same time documenting the decline of its unfortunate author's sanity. Of course, Warhammer being Warhammer, the work itself can be a vector of the corrupting influence of Chaos, and as such it was deemed too dangerous for general usage, and locked away for only the Grand Theogonist to consult... That is, until somehow copies of it began circulating some years later, causing Sigmarite Witch Hunters a collective case of brown pants followed by feverish tome-burning of limited success.
As Archives of the Empire Volume II from Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th Edition shows us, Kless actually survived the ordeal and reporting back to the commissioners, and, in consideration of his service, was sent to spend the rest of his gibbering days in the Great Hospice of Shallya, a short distance from Altdorf. Uncommonly merciful for the Warhammer setting... but then you realise the poor man would perhaps have preferred being put out of his misery, were his thoughts still coherent. Every of his sleeping hours is tormented by the nightmares of what he has seen - so much so he attempts to avoid sleeping as much as he can. He spends his time whimpering to himself, occasionally flying into rants about what he has seen, especially in those exceedingly rare cases the Dark Powers are mentioned within his earshot. While most of the time they are just the ravings of a disturbed individual, occasionally his ramblings provide a dangerous glimpse of the forbidden knowledge he had collected on his damned journeys. Of course, every understood raving pushes the listener ever forward on the path of damnation just as he had. The book suggest that while his records are kept in a lockbox in the sanatorium's treasury, and nobody but the High Priestess within, and a handful of individuals without, know who Richter really is, it's likely some of the Shallyan Sisters have paid too much attention to his screaming, and may be suffering from nightmares or minor mutations...
The End Times revealed that the poor sod was still alive at the time the world was getting nommed. Somehow, at some point, he must have escaped the hospice, and found his way into the Warp again, coming across Araloth and totally-not-Kaldor Draigo in their quest to rescue Shallya. As of the end of 2022, he hasn't made an appearence in Age of Sigmar yet, but it's likely he's still aimlessly wandering the Empyreum, much to the amusement of the Four.
The Liber Chaotica[edit | edit source]
In our world, the books have been published in 2003 and 2004, with Richard Williams authoring the first, and Marijan Von Staufer the others, presenting themselves as Sigmarite priests editing and sorting through Kless' progressively degenerating writings. The fifth, in-universe only addressing Chaos Undivided, out-of-universe also includes the first four.
Book 1: Liber Khorne[edit | edit source]
A good chunk of this chapter documents the various tribes of Chaos Vikings, their lifestyles, and their peculiar customs in a detached, informative style. Beyond that is a discussion on how the warriors of the Blood God differentiate themselves from their peers, including their mutations and weapons (one of which includes a goddamn chainsword).
After a discussion on the similarities between Khorne and Khaine and a description of the Daemons of Khorne, shit gets WEIRD.
Through torturous visions, he sees the Black Crusades of Abaddon as well as the forces of the Khorne Berzerkers and the Daemon Engines of the Dark Millennium. The last segment documents an even stranger vision which is a (false) prophecy about the end of the world as we know it.
Book 2: Liber Slaanesh[edit | edit source]
The first part of this book takes to describing the nature of the Lord of Excess, in a way that's beyond just the meme-ridden "Drugs & Sex" business, and how one can even describe excess. Following that is a discussion on the Cults of Chaos: how they operate, who leads them, and how they manage to infiltrate civilized territories, as well how people get convinced to follow them. As it turns out, pleasure cults tend to stem from some innocent interests, like art and music.
The next part discusses a tale of two brothers, one who fell to Slaanesh and turned into...something less human, and one who joined Khorne and became a Daemon Prince. Following that is an in-depth description of an exorcism and the many rituals that take place during this occasion.
The most intriguing segment involves Richter's conversation with a debauched Bretonnian noble who formed his own pleasure cult before getting busted by the Witch Hunters and sentenced to death. This noble seems to hold no resentment or remorse for what happened, and doesn't so much as hate the Cult of Sigmar as he does find it completely boring. Instead, he tries to humanize Slaanesh and preach that the Chaos Gods aren't entirely evil. Indeed, he was so interested in Richter that he gives some poetry in hopes of convincing the author about his views.
Following that is a dive into the relationship between the Elves and the Chaos Gods, how the Dark Elves are totally not Chaos, and in particular how Aenarion, first king of the High Elves, became a vessel for Asuryan. After this is a description of those tribes of warriors enslaved by Slaanesh, with segments dedicated to Styrkaar, Dechala the Denied One, and Azazel. His dissertation on the daemons of Slaanesh are written as he finds himself again stuck in the Realms of Chaos, witnessing their pleasures.
This time, his visions of the Dark Millennium see him describe the Noise Marines as well as the Birth of Slaanesh, as perpetrated by the Eldar.
Book 3: Liber Nurgle[edit | edit source]
A.K.A. the one where poor Richter starts losing it.
The first part of this book sees plenty of debate about the nature of despair, how Nurgle feasts upon it, and how to combat it, with one standout reference being a speech written by the Emperor Magnus the Pious following the Great War Against Chaos. An equally large part of this book has Richter working alongside a Sister of Shallya in treating the various illnesses she encounters, which has Richter himself bemoan the shitty health practices of the Empire, including how they treat those afflicted with a great illness. He makes a more passionate cry for help later on, damning the Empire's own ostracizing of the sick as empowering the Lord of Decay.
The research into the mortal champions of rot does not only see reference to human servants (Particularly Feytor the Tainted and Valnir the Reaper) and the Great War Against Chaos, but also give some overdue coverage on the Beastmen menace (with particular attention to the ravages laid by Gorthor the Beastlord). The discussion on the Daemons of Nurgle sees Richter dragged again to Chaos-land, though this time there are no references to the Death Guard or their Plague Marines.
Book 4: Liber Tzeentch[edit | edit source]
The first chunk of this book sees Richter try to explain how the Great Conspirator works and how he has his cults organized (or rather, how they avoid being organized). In particular, he presents a paper documenting the damnation of Egrimm van Horstmann, former Patriarch of the College of Light and full-time heretic and cult-leader, as written by the current Patriarch, a former apprentice. Of course, this also includes discussing the viking legions of Chaos, with an article focusing on Aekold Helbrass.
The next part focuses on the nature of magic and how the Old World classifies the Winds of Magic. This of course also includes the Elf-exclusive (and Slann, though Slann only do High Magic, they have way better methods than crappy Dark Magic spells to blow shit up) winds of High and Dark magic as well as the differences between arcane magic and 'divine magic' (as Tzeentch calls it). After this is a paper written by that Bretonnian Noble from the Slaanesh Chapter challenging man's concept of evil and how man is responsible for making the Gods, a matter Richter discusses further in the next segment.
His segment on the Daemons of Chaos sees him visit a very angry red cyclops alongside the other daemons of Tzeentch. None of it is very pretty and coherence is pretty poor.
Book 5: Liber Undivided[edit | edit source]
By this point, whatever sanity Richter had left has abandoned him. He has also mysteriously vanished, as the editor assembling this comments that he was nowhere to be found. Rather than a coherent tome (as much as such a tome could have been, that is), this is more a compilation of notes.
This last tome is effectively about Chaos Undivided and the process of how the Everchosens come to be. Of course, this is made as an attempt to understand Archaon, the latest of the Everchosen, and how he got so twisted into serving Chaos.
The following part is a discussion about polytheism in general, breaking down the various gods of the Empire and neighboring nations, and how Sigmar is unlike them by being a man-turned-god. Of course, that crazy count from before somehow returns with his own article explaining how Undivided might also just mean 'in service to a minor god without a realm'. Another piece documents how Richter came to learn of Be'lakor, first and only Undivided Daemon Prince.