As the daemon sagged back against the wall, feeling her soul pulled back to the Empyrean by the Primarch's psychic might, Mortarion continued to hammer her furiously with his fists, pouring out all of his fury onto the broken physical shell. It was Guilliman's tactical acumen that first stabilised the many war fronts of Ultramar, and his "Spear of Espandor" campaign, a brilliant counterattack, that successfully bought the forces of the Imperium still more time. It is said that the next attack that descended from the mountains above was repulsed quickly and Mortarion, leading his Death Guard, as they had become known, followed them into the fog above, massacring the remaining forces and killing the warlord. The Khan prepared to settle their argument once and for all. Published by on October 31, 2021. Nurgle responded gleefully and took the XIV Legion and Mortarion for his own champions. The Lord of Death appeared aboard the Vengeful Spirit, his putrid stench sending all but Horus, Abaddon, and Tormageddon into convulsions. Mortarion's name comes from the Latin word Mors, meaning death. In 437.M36, Mortarion emerged at the head of a Death Guard and Nurgle-Daemon army that led to the Fall of Sanctia. [6a] Mortarion led his Legion in their betrayal of the Imperium at the Battle of Isstvan III and Drop Site Massacre. Mortarion revealed his true colours during the scouring of Istvaan III, when he willingly sent potentially Loyalist elements of the Death Guard into Horus' trap. He might burn himself out to get to Terra, he might not. In the subsequent Battle of Catallus, the joint Death Guard-Emperor's Children fleet led by Mortarion cornered the White Scars fleet at the Dark Glass artifact. However, the young primarch's questions began to turn towards subjects the Overlord did not want to talk about, namely the pitiful creatures in the valleys that the many warlords preyed upon for corpses to reanimate and bodies to warp. The Death Lord at last was worthy of his title. In Mortarion's opinion it should have been cordoned off, put away, forgotten about forever by Mankind. The creature's bonds were suddenly shattered and her human shell peeled away, revealing her glossy, insect-like true form. For a moment he considered killing the child, but he realised that no human should be able to breath at this height, let alone cry out. You like Cults and you want to help us continue the adventure independently?Please note that we are a small team of 3 people, therefore it is very simple to support us to maintain the activity and create future developments.Here are 4 solutions accessible to all: ADVERTISING: Disable your banner blocker (AdBlock, ) and click on our banner ads. But as others have said, 'salvation' can also just mean death. Mortarion and the Death Guard would draw out the enemy and tire them down, and then the Luna Wolves would strike. At the Gates of Parmenio, Guilliman defeated the Greater Daemon Septicus and his Plague Guard. There's this theory about the Emperor not actually "talking" but rather transmitting ideas and letting the recipients process them in their own way. That's the way I took it. Returning to the village, Mortarion's mood darkened when he found his people talking not of his victory but of the arrival of a benevolent stranger who promised salvation to the people of Barbarus. How could he not be? Though the Primarch's physical strength was enormous, the daemon knew that it would not help him, for she was not a creature of realspace, defined and constrained only by laws and powers that the Primarch feared to invoke. Desperate, Mortarion offered his Legion and his own soul up to the Ruinous Powers in exchange for deliverance. [6b], Mortarion crash landed on the world of Barbarus. He only ever found friendship in two other Primarchs, Night Haunter and Horus. The stranger commented that even Mortarion and his Death Guard were having trouble pacifying the final warlord, and offered a challenge. Abaddon the Despoiler united the disparate factions of the Eye of Terror and unleashed the 13th Black Crusade to bring ruin to the world that had proven his nemesis for millennia. He hated to see the three of them getting dragged in deeper by the Emperor's hypocrisy. Once the Astartes who remained loyal to the Emperor were purged, the Death Guard then fought alongside their Traitor brethren during the Drop Site Massacre on Istvaan V. Mortarion, the Death Lord, during the Horus Heresy. The Legion's gene-seed seemed to amplify the uncommon resistance to contagion and toxins in its Barbarus candidates to unheard-of levels. Dark Imperium: Godblight, the next book in the Dark Imperium series, was announced during the Black Library Preview way back in December 2020.Along with the conclusion of a story that's been in the works since the days of Roboute Guilliman's awakening, new editions of the original books (Dark Imperium and Plague War) are soon to be available for pre-order. He realised that the prey that the warlords fought over was his own people, and with this came a sense of hatred and he vowed to give them justice over their oppressors. After Mortarion himself became infected, he confronted Typhon aboard the Navigator's station on the Terminus Est. A subreddit for the lore and stories encompassing the dark future of the Warhammer 40,000 franchise I think he is fully serious. The martial stratifications of Old Earth's warmasters were done away with too, and eventually the XIV Legion's Librarius was disbanded thanks to Mortarion's hatred of witchery such as that the hated charnel masters of Barbarus had once wielded. https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/mediawiki/index.php?title=Mortarion&oldid=508031. The High Overlord, Necare of Barbarus, took the child in with the intention of creating a son and heir, naming him Mortarion -- "child of death" in the local Barbaran dialect of High Gothic. Moreover, it was no mere squadron that had arrived, but an entire Death Guard battle group. Mortarion saluted the Khan mockingly, and spears of hard-edged light lanced down from above, bursting through the cloud cover and crashing through the heart of the ruined Tizca pyramid they had been fighting within. He is posed wielding his massive scythe - Silence - on a bulkhead within a ship. The only way to save themselves was to swear allegiance to Nurgle. When Mortarion had recovered he bent his knee to the stranger and pledged his service. Once-gloried hive cities became pits, and Agri-worlds became flyblown wastes. Descending upon the battlefields of the 41st Millennium on wings of tattered leather is Mortarion, the Daemon Primarch of Nurgle. Mortarion returned to his village, confident in the knowledge that he would return for his final battle. One of the greatest sources of Perturabo's bitterness in canon was that he only wanted to be a builder of civilizations and an architect of wonders, but instead was relegated to thankless sieges and other unpleasant tasks until he finally snapped. Most assuredly not their brother Angron, nor the half-mad Konrad Curze. Magnus' shade had showed him. That implies that they can be stolen at all. [1][6b], When the confrontation came, it was mercifully short. Soon, villages were becoming strongholds and the villagers were more effective defenders. But it had all gone wrong. Mortarion made his peace with the truth, believing that it was better to be a master of the Warp than its pawn. the emperor speaks to mortarion. He was given command of the Death Guard Legion on the arrival of the Emperor to his world of Barbarus but turned to the forces of Chaos during the Horus Heresy. Mortarion ordered the orbital bombardment immediately. Harris's voice will be heard for a while."Los Angeles Times "A pleasurable sense of dread."The Wall Street Journal "Enormously satisfying . It therefore made a great impact upon the opinion of the Emperor, and drove Magnus to defend the use of psychic abilities with more drive and passion than he had originally intended. depressed boyfriend says i deserve better; are flowers allowed in the catholic church during lent The Legion's name was then changed in accordance with this decree, and Mortarion's words were engraved above the airlock door of the Battle Barge Reaper's Scythe in honour of that moment. Until he knew, beyond a shadow of doubt, who was ally and who was an enemy, he refused to choose sides. Mortarion proceeded to explain the reason for his recent arrival; he told Jaghatai that he had sought him out, for things had changed. He still believed that humanity must guard against it -- push it back. The stranger challenged the young primarch to capture the last mansion alone, but if he failed he would join the stranger in total obedience. The Death Guard did not garrison, they did not build, they only tore down and slew, coldly, determinately and with the inexorable progress of a contagion or a tsunami wave, and worlds fell before them. Mortarion didn't need much convincing to join Horus, having come to hate both his father and the civilian leadership of the Imperium, wanting the strong to rule over the weak. Garro died, but not before giving Mortarion a painful wound in his neck with the broken shard of Libertas. Meanwhile, Mortarion was frequently critical of Magnus the Red over his use of Librarians and was one of the chief voices to ban Psykers among the Astartes Legions at the Council of Nikea. At this same time he was tasked with Horus to find and destroy the White Scars, who had been harrying the traitor lines since the events on Prospero. [19] During a war council he mocked Perturabo for not fully embracing Chaos but nonetheless allowed Typhus to work with the Iron Warriors Primarch as part of a ritual to weaken the Emperor's psychic shield of the Palace. Upon Typhon's advice, Mortarion would make the journey inside the Terminus Est as opposed to the Endurance. The Primarchs is the chance to show what the traitors were really about before their turn, . Unlike Angron and Fulgrim, he did not even attempt to penetrate the Emperor's psychic shield around the Palace. Jaghatai explained that the reason neither one of them would ever rule the galaxy is that both of them were never the empire-builders. He pledged himself to Nurgle and the torture ceased. Mortarion was given the Death Guard legion, who specialized in bio-weapons and rad-weapons, as they could endure far more harsh conditions than their brothers. From Mortarion's POV, he thinks the change is irreversible. Those beautiful wing eyes on the wings, and the complete dissonance between the healthy looking eyes and Mortarion's horrible visage really add a lot to it. However thanks to the Emperor's power being infused into him by Keeler, Garro was able to fight Mortarion back for a time but was still ultimately no match for the Daemon Primarch's power. Their father had tried to pretend that it was not there, the Warp, as if He were not already up to His elbows in its soul-sucking filth. [1][6b], The winner of the battle in which Mortarion had landed was the greatest of the warlords. Daemon Primarch Mortarion leads the Forces of Chaos against the Grey Knights. Mortarion was found on Barbarus, a planet covered in toxic fumes. His flesh was somehow bleaker, his stance a little more crabbed, and yet the aura of intimidation around him had been augmented. Out right forgiveness would not be trusted or accepted by mortgage but the promise of a mere chance sometime in the future. Magnus helped Mortarion control his new abilities, allowing the Primarch to regain his lost composure. Mortarion dispatched the warlord and his place among the villagers was sealed. [1][6b], His acceptance into the community of humans was not easy. The Death Guard primarch attempted to sway the Khan to Horus' cause as Jaghatai had surmised, to imagine a galaxy of warriors, of hunters, where the strong were given their freedom to act as they would, unbound by the Emperor's demands. It might take him a few dozen thousand years, but I don't doubt he or someone else could steal them again. He had been on the Khan's heels since Ullanor. He was still waiting, though not for very much longer. 1082 Words5 Pages. This was Mortarion's great project. There had been no detail then, no authentication, just stray astropathic messages of dubious provenance. While Mortarion has established that the change is irreversible that could be seen more as the words of Nurgle put in his mouth (God of Despair and all that), since according to the previous theory if he had actually believed this he would have been literally incapable of understanding the message as hope but rather he would have heard the ultimate insult. The Overlord kept him caged to acclimate to the poison, and taught him the art of war. The Second Battle of Prospero was over. In an ironic twist of fate, Mortarion has become exactly like the Overlords of Barbarus he vowed to kill ten thousand years ago. The strange tides of the Empyrean are notoriously fickle, and during their voyage the entire Death Guard fleet was becalmed within its shifting dimensional tides. [19a] Mortarion next met with Magnus in order to discuss an attack on the Colossi Gate, revealing to his brother that he hated his current Daemonic visage and was in constant pain. But even death brought no freedom from its torment. The constant exposure to the toxins hardened his warriors, a useful and transferable skill retained by the Death Guard. When the shields were depleted shortly after he personally killed Torghun Khan, Mortarion barely teleported off the Swordstorm before it exploded. Mortarion had never encountered its kind before, believing his father, the Emperor, that such fell creatures did not exist. The Khan observed him guardedly, for Mortarion had always been hard to read. [24], Following the withdrawal of Perturabo and the Iron Warriors from Terra Horus gave Mortarion the Lion's Gate Spaceport, which he turned into his own personal headquarters. Chagrined by his defeat at the hands of Jaghatai Khan, Mortarion abandoned the pursuit of the White Scars and instead led his Death Guard in a spiteful, punitive rampage across the systems of the lost Prosperine empire. His words were simple and delivered in a harsh whisper that never the less carried to each and every one: "You are my unbroken blades. He had come home.[1][16][25]. These were members of Mortarion's elite bodyguard, the Deathshroud. This combat tactic worked brilliantly, and Mortarion grew close to Horus. [22b] According to Rotigus, both Mortarion and Ku'gath have earned the displeasure of Nurgle for their insubordination and failure. Upon her discovery, he had his captive teleported with him back aboard his flagship, the Endurance. And yet the question is a fair one. In the end, Horus was defeated by the Emperor, but unlike the other Legions, who splintered and fled into the Eye of Terror, Mortarion's Legion, now calling themselves the Plague Marines, made an orderly withdrawal, wave after wave of Loyalists breaking themselves on the Legion. Eventually, Mortarion could suffer no more and gave himself over to Chaos to stop the pain. Back on Ullanor, even at the height of their triumph, he had not possessed quite the same heft. A dread aristocracy they soon became, while the youngest and strongest like Calas Typhon took full or partial conversion into the Legiones Astartes, heedless of the high fatality rate that late induction carried with it. Due to the Destroyer Hive, Typhon quickly came back to life. If anything it speak to how much Swallow dropped the ball with the Death Guard; The Pale King is a story we really needed to see. If he wanted to know the truth, then it would be revealed. Credit: Robert "TheChirurgeon" Jones. [1][6b], Mortarion then recruited the strongest and most resilient of warriors from the villages he went to. From that power base, the Death Guard and daemonic Plague Legions issued, systematically reaping planet after planet. Mortarion with his Deathshroud during the Horus Heresy. Guilliman heard Mortarion speak, but he could not see, and he could sense nothing else but pain. But this was exactly why Mortarion had come to find Jaghatai. He experimented with both Xenos and Chaos artifacts, vowing to remain pure through understanding. These tensions became most clear in the period directly preceding the first battle of the Horus Heresy at Istvaan III, when approximately one-third of the Legion was judged by Mortarion to be likely to remain loyal to the Emperor when the Legion joined the Warmaster Horus in his rebellion against the Imperium. Then, the stranger stepped between them and, defying the fog, killed the warlord with one mighty sweep of his sword[1][6b]. For example Guilliman heard his full list of official titles when the emperor called his name, but others would just hear the way they called him. Their weapons and armour were powered by the energies of Chaos and they became known as the Plague Marines, although they would still use the name of the Death Guard for themselves. He also really hated psykers, taking a leading role in the anti-psyker faction at the Council of Nikea. After witnessing the Overlords hauling captive humans away for torture and experimentation[17a], Mortarion escaped from his holdings and descended the mountain, the warlord bellowing after him of his treachery and that to return would mean death.