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By Order of the Eternal Hegemon, The following is decreed in all of the Realm of Vandemar, Any who are loyal to the Hegemony are to reinforce and Support it with sweat, blood and zeal, Any who finds themselves opposed will give their life To see the vision enacted. The Eternal Throne Watches. Glory to the Hegemony. Glory to the Hegemon. |
| The twin suns of Vandemar cast their golden light through the uppermost dome of the Sanctum Strategium, illuminating the throne of blackstone and gold where the Hegemon sat in absolute stillness. Before him, the chamber was empty save for the Herald-Primate, robed in robes of irongray and crimson, his voice echoing through the silence like the toll of a cathedral bell. "By the will of Imperius, chosen of the Eternal Throne, Sovereign of Steel and Light, Voice of Valkorion Ascendant… the Iron Protocols are proclaimed." The voice was calm, ritualistic, but every word carried the weight of decree. Holo-pylons activated across the room, revealing planetary maps, data-chains of logistical throughput, and the shifting alignments of regional battlefleets. These were not merely displays—they were vows made visible. Across the Realm of Vandemar, billions bore witness to the pronouncement through massive cathedral-audio projectors, vox-screens, and ritual-scripted bulletins. From the steel hives of Vandemar Ultima to the wind-scoured bastions of Vengaard, the message was singular and unmistakable: Within the upper spire of the Strategium, the Hegemon remained still, but not idle. His presence emanated like a silent storm—disciplined, absolute, and suffocating. Before him, the three figures of the Legion Command clad in obsidian-black armor lined with gilded trim, the sigils of the Indomitus Legion embossed upon their pauldrons. To their side stood a trio of Indomitus Scions, their faces hidden behind bronze visors shaped into expressions of silent judgment. With them were the Lord-Governors of the planets, certainly less comfortable but nevertheless proud in their individual heraldries. Imperius finally stood, his burgundy and gold robes trailing behind him like a war-banner stitched from dusk itself. "The Iron Protocols are not merely a command," he spoke—his voice like the grinding of a power press. "They are destiny made manifest. Traelis shall be tamed in full. Mithras will birth armies without pause. Vandemar Ultima shall become a living engine of the divine. Every forge, every soldier, every soul—shaped to purpose." The chamber trembled not from sound, but from will. "We were once vassals. No longer." A pause, then a faint smile. "Zakuul is ash. But we—are flame." Across the subsector, immediate mobilization began. On Vharendar, entire city sectors were cleared for new foundry complexes. On Kalidor, precision drones mapped vast agricultural territories for mechanization. The Scions launched their initial audits, quietly purging local guilds of ideologically lax members before their names reached higher echelons. But even as preparations commenced, one truth resonated above all: this was not mere expansion. This was reformation by fire. An entire subsector—an entire people—would be remade into a bastion of eternal war-readiness. Not for defense. But for dominion. |
Age of Dread
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Consolidation Anvil of the Hegemon: Realm of Vandemar [Defence Upgrade]
Ref-Inq: 1-Onith/137100d-0002
Author: Equerry Anaryen
Subject: Iron Protocol Planning
Location: Vandemar, Spire Prime, Sanctum Strategium
Subsector: Vandemar
Sector: Vandemar
Access Grade: Legion Command, High Lords of the Hegemony
The holotable pulsed with radiant life — a living map of the Subsector etched in flickering blue and gold, every world projected in rotating detail, every orbital route, defensive ring, and logistics line marked with surgical precision. The atmosphere was one of absolute purpose; no voice was raised in uncertainty, no motion wasted.
Around the table stood those who would enact the Hegemon’s will.
Seated at the table’s cardinal points were the four pillars of the Indomitus Legion, each embodying a distinct arm of the Eternal Hegemony's war doctrine.
Lord Praetor Urienz, robed in shimmering sable armor inlaid with silver filigree, radiated serenity. His eyes, pale as frost, betrayed no emotion as they studied the projections of Mithras and Traelis. The Force stirred around him like a silent current— calm, but deep and perilous.
Lord Imperatant Talos, by contrast, leaned forward, his crimson-caped armor catching the light as his gauntleted hand slammed against the table’s edge. “Mithras is ready,” he declared, voice like thunder. “My knights hunger for cause. The forges are idle only because we wait on approval, not capability.”
High Justice Azulia, seated to his left, tilted her head ever so slightly. Her uniform bore no ostentation, only the sigil of Rurik's Watch — a burning eye enclosed in a circle of chains. “And what good is hunger without control?” she asked coldly. “The Indomitus Knights must not forget their dedication to the Doctrine of Eternal Obedience. I will not have emotional impulse undermining structure.”
Talos turned sharply, but Urienz raised a single hand. The motion, subtle and graceful, stopped both in their tracks.
“Purpose without unity is entropy,” Urienz said softly. “We forge not just armies—but unity. Let Talos have his knights prepared, and let Azulia temper them. Both are necessary.”
At the fourth seat stood Grandmaster Nathaniel of the Indomitus Scions. He said nothing. His armored form remained still, visor dark, gloved hands folded before him like a resting predator. Yet all felt the weight of his presence. Every governor, every general in the room instinctively avoided his gaze.
Behind them, the planetary lords stood in ordered rows — Lord-Governor Cestus of Traelis, bearing the soot-stains of industry; Lord-Governor Lysana of Vandemar, wrapped in ceremonial dark green; Lord-Governor Duval of Vandemar Ultima, draped in data-vestments; and others still, each awaiting instruction.
Urienz finally gestured, and the table shifted—zooming in on each planetary capital in turn.
“You will begin immediately,” the Praetor said. “Ultima will increase its output within two standard cycles. Vandemar will accelerate its harvest-mechanisation protocols. Mithras will raise a further Host. Traelis will be purged of all remaining threats—flora, fauna, and dissent alike.”
Azulia’s voice followed like a scalpel: “And all governors will submit their leadership cadres to ideological integrity review. The Scions will observe. Any failure will be rectified.”
A collective breath was drawn—but none dared protest.
Only Grandmaster Nathaniel spoke, and his voice was quiet, chilling.
“One mind. One will. Or none at all.”
In silence, the governors bowed.
Thus, the Hammer of the Realm was lifted and its first blow was imminent.
Ref-Inq: 1-Onith/137100d-0003
Author: Lord Governor Duval
Subject: Iron Protocol; Ultima Stage One
Location: Vandemar Ultima, Hive Spire Hallex
Subsector: Vandemar
Sector: Vandemar
Access Grade: Ultima Planetary Command, Legion Command, High Lords of the Hegemony
The sky above Vandemar Ultima was a perpetual furnace of ash and glare. The world did not sleep—it hummed, a constant chorus of industry and movement. Billowing spires vomited plumes of steam and exhaust, conveyor belts kilometers long carried ordnance to distant hangars, and echoing below all of it were the boots of the Imperial Army and the thunderclap march of Skytroopers in perfect synchrony.
Hive Spire Hallex—primary administrative and industrial node—had become the beating heart of transformation.
Lord-Governor Duval, draped in high-function robes and flanked by an escort of mechanical aides, surveyed the ever-expanding grid from a reinforced command balcony. His face, weathered but alert, bore the expression of a man who knew how to turn quotas into power. Below, the avenues of Hive District Primus were a blur of tracked vehicles, cargo haulers, and the occasional streak of patrol craft flaring low between gantry pylons.
"We’ve already broken the three-thousand-unit threshold for standard-pattern munitions,” Duval reported over encrypted link to the Sanctum Strategium. “Initial targets exceeded. Fabricator nodes eight through twenty-two are at 112% output.”
Behind him, the roar of Skytrooper deployment pods could be heard as they slammed into the repurposed transit squares. From each, glistening ranks of white-and-chrome droids marched forth, forming phalanxes under the silent commands of relay-hubs installed across the Hive.
The Imperial Army regiments, newly reinforced from Mithras and Vengaard, moved among them—human soldiers and droid enforcers operating in brutal cohesion. The goal was not merely production, but discipline through presence.
As ordered by the Legion Command, Vandemar Ultima was being restructured into a doctrinal exemplar—a place where industrial output, military control, and ideological purity coalesced.
Above the Spire, construction servitors extended the scaffolding of a new Shrine-Dome, a temple-fortress dedicated to the Eternal Flame and the divinity of the Hegemon’s bloodline. Within its central chamber would rest a databank-vault: an integrated hub for ideological monitoring, Skytrooper reprogramming nodes, and loyalty index records of every registered worker in District Primus.
Duval turned to one of the attending Scions—a silent figure in pale steel, visor dark, hands folded behind his back.
“The worker blocs remain compliant,” Duval said. “Sermon-cycles are functioning. Uplift quotas have been met.”
The Scion said nothing—but slowly inclined his head.
Behind them, the rhythmic chants of indoctrination priests echoed through the megaphone lattices. Vox-prayers interwoven with production metrics played continuously over the city-wide channels:
By dusk, a new division of war materiel was loaded onto atmosphere lifters bound for Vharendar and Mithras. A fresh regiment of conscripts—tested and indoctrinated—stood at parade rest, watched by both human officers and emotionless Skytroopers.
And above all of it, the words of the Hegemon echoed from the Shrine-Dome construction banners:
The transformation had begun.
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Ref-Inq: 1-Onith/137100d-0004
Author: Grandmaster Hagen
Subject: Iron Protocol; Operation Firebreeze
Location: Traelis, Praevia Justitia Strategium
Subsector: Vandemar
Sector: Vandemar
Access Grade: Common Command, High Command, Legion Command
The skies over Traelis howled like a wounded beast, its stratosphere torn by glacial storms that never ceased. Ice-choked winds screamed across frozen mountain ranges, lashing against dropcraft as they pierced the cloud ceiling. Below, the land was a world of jagged peaks, ice labyrinths, and snowfields concealing death at every turn. Temperatures plummeted far below survivable thresholds without full environmental protection—Traelis did not forgive trespass.
But the 2nd Host of the Indomitus Legion had not come seeking forgiveness.
They had come to purge.
HAAT/i assault gunships streaked down in tight phalanxes, engines roaring as they banked through pockets of turbulence and icy downdrafts. Their hulls bore the mark of the Eternal Flame and the sigils of the 2nd Host—four distinct Banners, each with its own heraldry etched into the plating: Bronze Wyrm, Black Crows, Stormbrand, and Oath-Vigil.
Inside each gunship stood the Legion.
Arrayed in their obsidian-black armor, the Indomitus Knights of the 2nd Host were motionless save for the subtle movements of systems checks. Each warrior was a product of brutal conditioning, military doctrine, and ideological purity. Five Companies to a Banner, ten Squads to a Company—each led by a Knight-Lieutenant. In total, two thousand warriors descended in the first wave.
Grandmaster Hagen stood at the heart of it all.
Encased in glacial-white command armor, the Grandmaster’s presence was that of a glacier itself: vast, implacable, and unyielding. He watched the descent from his command deck aboard the Praevia Justitia, a repurposed orbital cruiser converted into a mobile base of operations. His voice was deep, toneless, and final.
The ground assault began with thunder.
HAAT/i gunships dropped into rapid hover-deployment across multiple ridgelines and glacial basins, disgorging squads of Indomitus Knights under covering fire. Skytrooper battalions, launched from fast-deployment pods, slammed into the periphery of known fauna nests. They advanced in lockstep, unbothered by the cold, cutting down anything that moved with synchronized blaster fire and repulsor blasts.
At first, the purge seemed clinical.
But Traelis, like all Death Worlds, had teeth.
From beneath the glaciers, the Thermokar Beastclades emerged—enormous arthropodal predators with subzero-adapted carapaces and thermal-sensing tendrils. Camouflaged within the snow, they erupted with devastating ambushes, rending open Skytroopers with claws that could shear metal. Their blood flash-froze on contact with air, forming ice-slick death zones.
One company from the Stormbrand Banner was overrun in less than seven minutes—its last vox transmission ending in a calm oath of fealty swallowed by static and wind.
But the Legion adapted.
Knight-Lieutenants ordered flamer squads forward, thawing frozen terrain and forcing the enemy into the open. HAAT/i gunships were rerouted for close air support, unleashing barrages of seismic charges into glacial fissures. Banner Masters directed artillery drop-pods into the center of the resistance, deploying self-deploying turrets and mobile shields.
It was not a battle.
It was a trial by ice and fire.
Grandmaster Hagen watched as reports of casualties came in—noted, filed, analyzed.
His verdict was calm.
Unbeknownst to many in orbit, a seed was already planted. Traelis would not only be pacified. It would become something more.
But for now, the 2nd Host waged war beneath the blizzards, and the howling wind bore witness.
