Changes

The Imperial Fleet had become entangled in a war of control against pirates and dealers of Velo Opaline leaving the land forces of the Imperial Guard without support and incapable of reorganization. The high command were desparate desperate to break this deadlock and the opportunity appeared when it was least expected.

The 72nd [[Drookian Fen Guard]], under the command of Colonel Woortan, were exploring the planet of [[Aelian VII]] to prepare the way for an offensive against the Aelian system. The failure of the Fleet to destroy the pirates of Velo Opaline had led to the suspendsion suspension of the offensive, which had left the 72nd isolated from the the main body of the Crusade and forced the soldiers to trust in on their abilities of survivalskills. unfortunately, the enemy, XII the XIIth Army of the Canis Hegemony, chose this moment to move on Aelian VII.

The first sign of the enemies intension intention was when a patrol of light cavalry of Drook ran into a an unit of enemy explorers engaged in reconisance reconnaissance in the low territories of the central plateau of Aelian. Colonel Woortan ordered an increase the of number of patrols, but he gave instructions that they were to observe and not engage the enemy because he needed to discover what they were planning and did not want to reveal the presence of his small army. Woortan realized that if he could attract all enemy towards Aelian, on everything to the marshy zones that surrounded the low plains by the plateau, he could use the superior abilities of his army to pin the enemy until the crusade forces arrived to aminister the deathblow. he was also conscious that their men did not have much of a chance of being successful unless they could pick their own place and the hour of battle. Woortan ordered the capture of an enemy patrol and, after a series of brutal interrogations, He he was able to use authentication codes that guaranteed the enemy landing took place in the zone that he choseof his choice.

The zone that Woortan chose was an enormous chain of marshes and bogs that later would be known as Traitors Moss. While the Fenguard took positions in bogs, the enemy began his disembarkation. The transports of the enemy landed on the luminous signals that they had captured from the explorers. Each one of the ships carried hundreds of men and tanks. When the first it touched earth, it became evident that the ground could not support the enormous weight of the disembarkation ship and, when it began to list and sink in the soft Earthearth, the rest of ships tried to alter their course. However, the approach vectors were already were fixed and the great mass and inertia of the troopships meant that it was impossible to alter course on time. In a matter of minutes, the disembarkation ships became clogged in mud as their passengers desperately tried to escape. At this moment he 72nd attacked. They emerged from marshes like ghosts and cut down the traitors in their hundreds. The Mounted Guard of the Marsh ranged through the fog while the engines of the descending ships vaporized marshes, annihilating without mercy the separatists with hunting lances. In less than one hour, enemy soldiers who had not been engaged by the men of Drook fled into the marshes and dispersed before thier their ferocious attackattackers. In less than one week the Drookians had hunted them down and those that did not die were taken as prisoners and handed over to the Crusade fleet when it arrived three months later.

Dring the Battle of Traitors Moss, fewer than 900 Fen Guards crushed a force of more than 20,000 separatists. The 72nd was granted Right of conquest to the continent as reward for the victory.