Eye of Terror

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Targetdrone.gif This article is about the galactic anomaly. For other uses of Eye of Terror, see Eye of Terror (disambiguation).
The Eye of Terror and its surroundings at the time of the 13th Black Crusade[11]

The Eye of Terror (Ocularis Terribus, Anathema Nonplus Ultra (Ordo Malleus[9]), Ocularis Malifica[16]) is a massive Warp rift, where the Warp co-exists with real space, the largest and most well-known in the Galaxy. It is located at the edge of the Galaxy, to the north and west of Terra, in the Segmentum Obscurus.[1]

Overview

The Eye of Terror is an area of the Galaxy where the Warp and realspace overlap. A ship can enter the Warp without a Warp drive simply by crossing its border. The area used to be the domain of the old Eldar empire. When Slaanesh was born, the energy of their birth permanently breached the veil between realspace and the Warp; all the planets and stars that existed in that area are now within the Warp. These worlds have become daemon worlds. At the very centre of the Eye lies the "byssos"[5], a hole in the fabric of reality through which raw Chaos energy pours out.[6]

History

The Eye of Terror is not a natural phenomenon, as it was created by the Old Ones during the War in Heaven, as they fought the Necrons. The Necrons would later seal the Eye of Terror closed but it was later reopened by the psychic shock wave that accompanied the birth of the fourth Chaos God, Slaanesh, during the Fall of the Eldar.[13]

The shock of the birth was so great it could not wholly be contained within the Warp, but spilled out into reality through the minds of the Eldar. Consequently, the Eye covers most of the region of the former Eldar Empire. Other zones of overlap were created, but the Eye is the most significant.[1]

Sometime at the dawn of the Imperium but before the Horus Heresy, the Eye of Terror was discovered by Imperial explorers in what was presumably a fairly remote region of the Galaxy, and Imperial scholars named is Cygnus X-1. The Eye didn't come into prominence until it was later discovered by the Word Bearers, who had arrived officially for conquest, but actually on a personal mission for renewed faith, and it was here that they discovered the "Primordial Truth". It would later be visited by the Emperor's Children and the Iron Warriors, intent on an expedition within the Eye, in search of the Angel Exterminatus. Before embarking upon this journey, Perturabo had formally named it the Eye of Terror.[7][8b]

Present day Eye of Terror and its surroundings[12]

Old star charts all came to map the Eye of Terror with the legend "Abandon hope all ye who enter here".[14a]

For the Traitor Legions, the Eye of Terror has been their exile, sanctuary, and safe haven for ten thousand years, from which they strike out at opportune, seemingly random moments. The Eye is also sanctuary for the most heretical renegades, fugitives of Imperial justice, and traitors throughout the Galaxy, and all are welcomed as fellow enemies of the Emperor and the Imperium.[1]

Main article: Cadian Gate

The Imperial world of Cadia was the nearest to the best-known stable gateway into the Eye, the Cadian Gate; consequently, it was the most fortified and militarised world in the Imperium, the first line of defense against Chaos incursions into real space. It would seem that ships exit through this gateway far more often than they enter it.[1]

Abaddon the Despoiler led an attack through the Eye of Terror during a massive campaign, the 13th Black Crusade, which sealed the fate of Cadia and many other systems.[2][3]

Description

General Geography

The geography of the Eye of Terror can best be described by the behaviours of the warp in this region:

1. When travelling near to the Eye of Terror, one will first notice a gradual increase in the distorting and mutating effects of the Warp.[19a] In terms of optical appearance, the Eye of Terror has a nebulous violet sheen with streaks of red, purple and blue.[20a][21] Imperial ships avoid the area around the Eye for thousands of light-years. Ships traveling too close to the Eye can be thrown far off-course - they can also be caught in temporal whirlpools which carry them backwards or forwards in time, or which trap them in limbo forever.[1][5]

2. This trend culminates into a "wall" of powerful warpstorms that effectively separate the inside of the Eye of Terror from the outside, as travel through them is next to impossible.[10a] Any attempts to cross these warpstorms with any semblance of an organised fleet are doomed to begin with, as the storms scatter the ships into all directions.[20b] The only safe and reliable opening in this barrier was the Cadian Gate, and the region was heavily defended and patrolled by the Imperium military.[1][5] It's not unusual for Chaos Warbands returning to the Eye of Terror to take up a resting-period in safe distance from these warpstorms, before they continue their travel through these warpstorms into the Eye of Terror proper.[19a]

3. Behind these warpstorms lies the inside of the Eye of Terror. Here, there are warpstorms as well, but also areas where the influence of the warp is faint, though never completely gone. Inside the Eye of Terror, realspace and warp overlap to various degrees, but there is never really a stable balance between them.[20b] These warpstorms and calm zones move about unpredictably inside the Eye of Terror in a chaotic sort of tides, but there are also areas that are constantly filled with warpstorms or constantly calm.[20a][20b][20c] There are stable secret pathways where a ship can travel through the Eye of Terror without encountering the dangers of the warp, though further details are scarce and the locations of these safe pathways are only known to the Eldar.[8a][8b]

4. In general terms, the influence of the warp gets stronger and stronger the closer you get to the centre of the Eye of Terror and even the most basic laws of nature begin to lose all meaning.[22a] At the very centre, there is pure warp.[19b]

The warp runs in currents and waves. Inside the Eye of Terror there are dead zones where certain currents of the warp end. If a Space Hulk is adrift in the warp and gets caught in one of these currents, it gets "washed ashore" in one of these dead zones in the Eye of Terror, where it can be claimed by enterprising warbands.[23a]

Celestial Regions and Objects

It is virtually impossible to make a map of the Eye of Terror. Objects, planets and stars change their positions, disappear or transform into something else. Very few locations in the Eye of Terror have a fixed position, and out of those most belong to the most powerful Daemons and Daemon Princes. The few others are hotly contested for their strategic value.[22b]

Inside the Eye of Terror, space is filled with all sorts disturbing phenomena, such as transparent curtains being suspended in mid-space, or faces and shapes appearing out of nowhere and disappearing again.[19c] Hailstorms of bloody skulls, fang-toothed tornadoes, crashing tsunamis of energy, "hungry" ghost suns,[38] and other suns which move and arrange into ever-new constellations, sometimes a giant face,[22c] sometimes elongated across impossible distances.[22a]

The Eye of Terror also contains destroyed planets, the remnants of the ancient Eldar Empire.[22d] Also spaceship-wrecks are adrift here, sometimes still inhabited by its crew.[22c]

There still are functional Webway-portals in the Eye of Terror. Most passages in the region that is now the Eye of Terror were destroyed during the birth of Slaanesh. Usage of the remaining portals and passages is impractical for servants of Chaos: out of those remaining passages, most are overrun with daemons and trespassing is simply too dangerous. Also many passages lead to places that used to be important during the days of the ancient Aeldari-empire but are entirely irrelevant nowadays. And in any case, only very few portals are known.[20d]

Rogue Celestial Objects:

Life in the Eye of Terror

Merely being inside the Eye of Terror is already extremely dangerous, though, ironically, a violent death at the hands of servants of the Dark Gods is one of the lesser worries. The main danger is the corruptive influence of the warp itself. Laws of nature become unreliable and the warp distorts flesh, soul and matter.[19b] Mortals within the Eye, constantly exposed to the effects of Chaos, are physically warped so their bodies come to reflect their flawed natures; the Death Guard, for example, worship Nurgle, Chaos God of Decay, leading their bodies to become bloated and putrid.[1]

Here are some examples of how these changes in the laws of nature can manifest: On Medrengard, the sky is blindingly white and the sun is black.[24a] On Drakaasi there is an ocean filled with blood instead of water, and it extends via rivers of blood deep in-land.[25a][25b] The planet Sublime is frozen in time mid-explosion. The planet is shattered into thousands of fragments which simply levitate suspended in space.[26a] The Planet of Sorcerers is covered with impossible landscapes that change all the time.[27a] The location of streets and buildings can change over-night.[23b]

Inside the Eye of Terror, if you think it, then the warp can make it become reality, though always at a price. Unfettered imagination is a very dangerous thing in the Eye of Terror, for it takes a disciplined mind to prevent these manifestations of the warp from getting out of hand. After the Horus Heresy, when hordes of traitors sought refuge in the Eye of Terror, those weakest of mind and least disciplined were very quickly culled, killed off by their own thoughts and fantasy run rampant.[20a]

For example, there are monumental architectures in the Eye of Terror, such as landscapes of skulls or fortresses fashioned from bones. However none of those are built or arranged by anyone. It is the warp that manifests them and turns them into reality, into matter, by reacting to thoughts. As another example, the Dark Mechanicum forge-world Gallium is covered with smelteries and forges, operated by robotic slaves with clock-work bodies. None of this industry was built, but rather it was the character of the Dark Mechanicum and Iron Warriors that rule this planet that subconsciously coaxed the warp into transforming the original landscape into this.[20e]

Humans, be they faithful Cultists or mere slaves, are no more than the playthings of the daemons and the chaos gods. For the glory of Chaos they undertake gargantuan, but nevertheless pointless projects. For example, they get divided up into armies and sent to fight each other, form giant religious ceremonies or build monuments or waste away with utter pointless work such as cataloguing and categorizing grains of sand. And this insanity can change into a different kind of insanity at any moment.[28a] However this is not true for all inhabitants of the Eye of Terror. Many slaves live rather predictable, though not at all comfortable or safe, lives in service to a warband or as workers in a forge.[28b][28c] And the warbands have their own designs, plans and goals.[10a][19d][19e]

There are the fortresses and domains of the Chaos Space Marines and the Dark Mechanicum, but even beyond those, the Eye of Terror is full of human settlements of all kinds of Cultists.[20c] Additionally, there are various kinds of mutant-tribes and mutant-hordes, ranging from primitive and feral up to those who have their own spaceships.[23a][29] Beastmen are also widely spread. They can be found in various breeds, loyalties and faiths on various planets.[27b][30][31]

Supposedly, there are thousands of planets inside the Eye of Terror which are free of the influence of the Traitor Legions.[20c]

Daemons can easily manifest.[19f] Weaker daemons are born all the time in the Eye of Terror where humans reside, from emotional events such as suffering or a murder. They are neither particularly intelligent nor strong, and some aren't even particularly evil. But most are a dangerous nuisance and not even worthy being bound into service and many warbands regularly send out hunting-parties on patrol to get rid of them.[20e][20f]

The constantly waxing and waning presence of the influence of the warp places a large strain on the minds of psykers. Resistance is futile, for even the strongest mind will eventually break. Rather psykers need to learn to let their mind flow with the warp instead of pushing against it.[19g]

Industry, Agriculture and Technology

Many Warbands of Chaos face shortages of ammunitions, spare-parts, energy, slaves, e.t.c., because there is no organised industrial infrastructure in the Eye of Terror, in contrast to the industrial support loyalist Space Marine Chapters get from the wider Imperium. Even if a Warband is lucky enough to control a planet in the Eye of Terror with a semblance of industry and means of production, they must constantly defend it against rival warbands seeking to raid and conquer.[10a] The denizens of the Eye of Terror are in a constant state of war with each for reasons such as supplies, territory and clean drinking-water, or sometimes simply for the sake of power, pride and glory.[10a][19d]

The Dark Mechanicum controls various forge-worlds in the Eye of Terror, where they produce and sell all kinds of war-supplies, up to and including warships and Chaos-Titans.[32][33][34] However, even the Dark Mechanicum is by no means unified. It is splintered into countless tiny domains, divided by bitter philosophical disputes.[20c]

Technological devices do not work properly inside the Eye of Terror but suffer from a variety of malfunctions due to the corrupting influence of the warp.[19c] This is the reason why Chaos Space Marines so willingly pay the high price necessary to buy or construct a daemon engine: It is the only kind of technology that works reliably in the Eye of Terror.[19c][19h]

This lack of industrial capacity, compared to the Imperium, is compounded by the fact that it is not possible to maintain an organised industry in the Eye of Terror.[10a] Warp-spawned plagues and pandemics regularly wipe out entire slave-populations. Some slave-raids by servants of Chaos serve the simple purpose to refill their slave-stock after it has died off yet again.[20a]

There is also no large-scale agriculture that could even feed a larger slave-population. For people in the Eye of Terror it is not unusual at all to feed on plants mutated by the warp, or to eat the dead. Some hunt mutants for food.[10a] Some Chaos Space Marines hunt feral, independent mutant tribes, who are not in service to some master, for sport and for food.[22e]

Even though those in the Eye of Terror have huge difficulties maintaining imperial technology, the strong presence of the warp in Eye of Terror allows for the construction of truly unique inventions that cannot be made anywhere else: There are several psychically active alloys which are used in sorcery and which can only be found in the Eye of Terror.[35] The Savage Morticians used a poison can only exist in the Eye of Terror.[24b] The fleet of the Warsmith contained a huge dropship that was a the product of a mixture of evolution, sorcery and impossible physics. The construction would not have been possible anywhere else but inside the Eye of Terror.[36]

Trade, Agents and Mercenaries

There are several large-scale trading-hubs, e.g. on the Daemon-world Sublime, which are generally respected as neutral territory where violence is frowned upon.[26a][22c])

There are not only the domains of Chaos Space Marines and Dark Mechanicum in the Eye of Terror.{Fn|20c}} There are billions upon billions of mutants living in the Eye of Terror, though they are relegated to the lowest rungs of power. These vast hordes make up the back-bones of most Chaos-armies and even go to war against each other for the opportunity to join a war or raid for murder and plunder.[29] They own their own spaceships and a sufficiently powerful Lord of Chaos will have no problem attracting their services.[23a] Beastmen can also be found on many worlds. There are several worlds inhabited by Beastmen worshipping Khorne.[30]

Assembling an army is not difficult in the Eye of Terror. Many servants of Chaos do not really care much for whom they fight or why. All they care for is to gain more power for themselves, by taking opportunities for murder, plunder and glory.[19e]

Espionage is a basic fact of life in the Eye of Terror and it is extremely difficult to keep major events a secret.[22f] The societies in the Eye of terror are rife with word-of-mouth, legends, stories and rumours, even amongst the lowest ranks of society.[22g]

If you are in want of information on the most esoteric and dangerous of topics, there are seers, sorcerers and other specialists available for hire in the Eye of Terror, at quite the price of course.[19c][37b]

The Warp Ghosts are an enigmatic and extremely secretive warband that rents out their services as ferrymen in the Eye of Terror. They are capable of navigating even the most dire of warpstorms by somehow finding calm pathways through them.[10b][37a] As payment, they sometimes take psykers[10b], and sometimes they take artefacts and supplies.[37a]

Around the Eye of Terror

The Eye of Terror in the Segmentum Obscurus before the formation of the Great Rift
Galaxy-Rift-Obscurus.jpg
Small cross.pngEye of Terror
The Eye of Terror after the formation of the Great Rift.
The Eye of Terror[17]

Due to the constant threat of raids and incursions, the Imperium is present in one way or another in almost every system within 500 light-years of the Eye. This presence can range from small listening posts to heavily fortified frontier worlds.[2][3][4]

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See also

Sources

Heretic Tomes banner.jpg

This article includes background material from a Black Library publication re-released under the Heretic Tomes banner which, per the Heretic Tomes Publication Disclaimer, contain parts which are considered outdated and in contradiction of established background lore.


Chaos
Gods of Chaos Khorne • Tzeentch • Slaanesh • Nurgle • Malice
Chaos Space Marines Traitor Legions • Daemonkin • Armoury • Warbands
Daemons Daemon Prince • Greater Daemon • Lesser Daemon • Daemonic Beasts • Daemon Engines • Daemonic Herald • Chaos Daemon Armoury • Daemon Weapons • Daemonic Gifts
The Lost and the Damned Chaos Cult • Traitor Guard • Mutants • Beastmen • Rogue Psyker • Gellerpox Infected • Armoury
The Traitor Primarchs Alpharius/Omegon • Angron • Fulgrim • Horus • Lorgar • Konrad Curze • Magnus the Red • Mortarion • Perturabo
Notable Characters Abaddon • Ahriman • Blue Scribes • Changeling • Epidemius • Fabius Bile • Horticulous Slimux • Kairos Fateweaver • Ku'Gath • Typhus • Khârn • Lucius • Lufgt Huron • Be'lakor • M'kar • The Masque • Rotigus • Shalaxi Helbane • Skarbrand • Skulltaker • Syll'Esske • Vashtorr
Other Traitor Titan Legions • Chaos Knights • Dark Mechanicum • Chaos Space Fleet • Chaos Vehicles • Chaos Artefacts • Great Rift • Eye of Terror • Maelstrom • Warp
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