Battle of Ordex-Thaag
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The Battle of Ordex-Thaag is a battle waged by the Imperium since the Great Rift's creation.[1]
Contents
Overview
Battle at Qysberg
The Forge World of Ordex-Thaag was abandoned in 633.M41 due to Greenskin attacks. The Orks eventually moved on, but the Adeptus Mechanicus could not spare resources to reclaim and resettle the planet. As far as the Mechanicum knew, the Ordex System lay in ruins. In truth, it had fallen under the control of Chaos Knights of the Dark Mechanicum. The Daemon-Splicers of the world approached Magnate Waersk of House Lucaris with an insane plan. On Ordex-Thaag, the Hereteks used Daemon Engines to drill to the planet's core and install corrupted machinery and binded daemonic essences. As the planet rotated, Ordex-Thaag served as a spindle for the Warp and force the Warp Rift known as the Siren's Storm wider and wider. The Hereteks wished to eventually twist the rift around the Ordex System before sending it towards Terra and the Golden Throne. Sometime later, the Reclamation Fleet of Magos Dominus Xu Kroll intercepted corrupted signals from the Forge World. Though many of his Astropath's died, Kroll knew exactly what the signal represented.[1a]
Kroll divulged his fellow Magi that his cult, the Teeth of the Cog, had acquired the powerful anti-psychic Varlian Device. He planned to unleash the device against the traitors as the Mechanicum launched their assault. Kroll authorized diversionary attacks on the walls of the traitor fortress of Qysberg to the north and south while he directed the major assault in the west. The first wave was a Knight assault led by Baroness Sordhen. The Martian cohorts attacked in carefully calculated waves, ranks of Skitarii, Legio Cybernetica Robots, and Battle Servitors marching towards Qysberg's outer walls as vehicles moved behind them. The Mechanicum forces unleashed a barrage upon Qysberg's flanks with an array of esoteric weaponry. The enemy responded with heavy fire of their own from the fortress' battlements and a bloody exchange of fire erupted. Kastelan Robots were able to reach the walls and form a breach which Kroll poured his warriors through as he advanced with the Varlian Device, floating upon a bier.[1b]
Within the courtyard of Qysberg, the Mechanicus forces encountered Chaos Knights. Assailed on all sides by the Fortress' defenses and dug-in Knights, the loyalists faced the true enemy resistance. Sections of curtain walls ground apart or closed together, exposing Martian forces or cutting them off from each other. Now desperate, Kroll knew time had run out to get the Varlian Device to the prime location. Canting a final prayer, Kroll fought his way back to the outer wall breach and detonated the device.[1b]
Advance on the Resonator-Spire
Meanwhile, Imperial Knights under Sir Dhekar moved to topple the resonator-spire, the source of the signal that the Reclamation Fleet had originally followed to Ordex-Thaag. Located in the northern hemisphere, while Baroness Sordhen led the majority of the Knights of the Padah March to tear open Qysberg citadel Drekhar was assigned to tear down the spire. Sordhen had shared the visions of her seers with her Nobles. She had interpreted their tales of a two-headed serpent as a reference to the twin evils of the Qysberg and the resonator-spire, and requested her Nobles to forgo fighting alongside her in order to secure the spire’s destruction. Sir Dhekar, Lady Olwyn and Sir Geherys proclaimed their acceptance of the quest, alongside young Nobles piloting Armigers and the Freeblade Morghant of Torres III.[1a]
Geherys and his Knight Valiant Felbane were the first to spot the spire. Above the spire's pinnacle the Knight's spotted a bulge of sickly green light, spinning and darkening. The air all around the construct swiftly condensed into a vapour the color of bile, with shadows moving within it. Reacting to the Knight's proximity, the shadows in the mist pulled themselves from its embrace and Daemons clawed forth. The Knights unleashed a thunderous opening salvo upon the Daemons, ripping many to pieces as a breach was formed in the Resonator Spire's fortress. Daemons forced themselves from the breach as the Knights sallied forward. Morghant urged the Lance forward as his Knight Paladin Scions of Torres was torn apart by masses of Plaguebearers. Nearing the Spire, Dhekar's Knight Drakfyre fired its Thermal Cannon. As the Spire was damaged, some of the Daemons became to dissipate. However the Knights could not cause enough damage to the structure to bring it down. The Knights pushed forward as mechanical horrors clawed from the chasms around the Spire, dragging smaller Knight's into the abyss with them. Honour Adamantus was charged by a towering winged beast and Lady Olwyn dueled with a Bloodthirster, narrowly missing a fatal blow to her cockpit and driving her own Chainsword into the monsters head. Her cries of victory were short-lived however, as a flock of Furies dove into the Knight's open chassis and ripped the pilot apart.[1b]
Drakfyre reached the Resonator-Spire and was attacked by a lithe Daemon wielding a whip of sinew. Morghant's Knight rushed forward to aid Dhekar, but the agile foe brought down the Freeblade. However the distraction gave Dhekar enough time to bring his Thunderstrike Gauntlet down into the Resonator-Spire's core and tear out whatever powered it. Above the battlefield the Warp imploded, ripping the Daemonic hordes from existence and bringing the entire structure down.[1b]
Battle at the Gatehouse
While Kroll attached Qysberg at several points and Dhekar attacked the Resonator Spire, Baroness Sordhen led the Knights of the Padah March in a frontal attack of 3 Lances on Qysberg's gatehouse, a mile from where Kroll waged his own battle. 25 Knights took part in the assault, half of which were from House Terryn. The others were from House Oebbern, House Griffith, and House Firehame. Sordhen’s attack on the Gatehouse was brutally direct but carefully planned. As well as the lance she had sent south to tear down the resonator-spire, the Baroness dispatched three further lances to bastions that surrounded her point of attack. In this way, she aimed to ensure that no traitors could attack them from the rear.[1c]
Knights with longer-ranged guns moved at the fore and flanks while siegebreakers pummeled the bastions energy shields. Armiger’s targeted Qysberg’s weapons batteries, blinding their sensors with squalls of interference. Coordinating their Ion Shields in defense, the Knights advanced up the Gatehouse’s inclined avenue. When the formation suffered damage they moved back, their place taken by another. In this way they ensured a continuous line of defense. Using this tactic the Gatehouse shields finally overloaded from constant attack, and now it Knight Castellans moved into the fore. Upon reaching Qysberg’s walls Knight Valiants unleashed their Thundercoil Harpoons, penetrating the walls and overloading the electronics of the enemy weapons batteries. Reeling in their harpoons, the Knights were able to topple a portion of the wall. With the breach made, the Knights from the formations center charged in, facing streaming caustic chemicals poured from murder holes, metal spars shot from hidden gravitic rails, and technovirus injectors coiled from the shadows. As they advanced deeper into the interior, the Chaos Knights fell upon the invaders. The defenders had superior numbers and mobility thanks to Qysberg’s hidden ways.[1c]
Faced with mounting losses, Sordhen reluctantly called for a retreat. Towards the West Sordhen saw the Mechanicu forces streaming back across the cracked plain, their own battle lost as well. Suddenly, Kroll activated the Varlian Device and the shockwave spread across the battlefield. Many of the Skitarii and Servitors stopped moving, but those clustered around data-tethers fared better. The Knights on both sides suffered grievously, the imprinted gheists of their Thrones Mechanicum screaming as they were stripped away. Several Knights collapsed; their pilot’s souls engulfed in entropy. But almost as quickly as it had struck, the null-field dissipated and the remaining Imperial Knights managed to outpace their reeling pursuers. Sordhen made contact with Kroll, finding the Tech-Priest rambling about triumph and acceptable losses. She realized her comrades deaths had been his doing, and in a rage her Knight snatched the Magos up, bringing him back to her landing ship.[1c] Aboard the vessel, she imprisoned Kroll and intended to take him back to Mars to stand trial before House Terryn’s High King. However when Kroll revealed he could block the Warp, Sordhen demanded she show him.[1d]
Daemonsurge
The Varlian Device had catastrophic effects on Ordex-Thaag, shattering the wards of binding that held the Daemonic essences within the planet’s core. Four primary Daemons managed to break free, and kill the Hereteks that had imprisoned them. They then sought to exact revenge on Magnate Waersk for binding them in the first place. They were able to track down Waersk and attack his Knight Despoiler ‘’Khorifex’’. They essences possessed his Throne Mechanicum and mutated the entire machine. Waersk pleaded with the Daemons, offering them service in his court. The Daemons laughed as ‘’Khorifex’’ formed a vortex that sucked in the surrounding Fallen Nobles. The Daemons were not yet done with this world.[1d] The wave of Daemonic corruption soon hit the Mechanicum Reclamation Fleet including Kroll’s flagship ‘’Regulus Prime’’. The vessel became boarded by Daemons and Magos Jabek attempted to organise a defense with his Skitarii forces. Many of the work gangs aboard the vessel became Daemonically corrupted and mutated, attacking their masters. Jabek and his retinue of Kataphron Battle Servitors were annihilated by a horde of these monstrosities. The leader of the Daemonic horde was able to capture Jabek and penetrated him with long talons, feeding its essence into the ship’s navigational controls. Couched to the ‘’Regulus Prime’s’’ command protocols, an order bled out to the other ships. As one, the fleet turned and powered towards the heart of the system’s star.[1d]
The fleet of the Padah March, however, was left untouched by the Daemons and Baroness Sordhen gave the order for them to leave Ordex-Thaag's System.[1e]
