The Pinnacle of the Great Crusade
In the distant reaches of the galaxy, a monumental battle marked the culmination of decades of war. The Ullanor Crusade, led by Horus, would become the greatest victory of the Great Crusade, earning him the title of Warmaster. This triumph, however, would also sow the seeds of catastrophe.
The Battle for Ullanor
The stage was set for an epic clash as 100,000 Space Marines from the Luna Wolves, Ultramarines, and White Scars Legions, supported by 8 million Imperial Army troops and hundreds of spacecraft, converged on the Ork Overlord Urlakk Urg’s stronghold. Horus, employing his favored tactic of a direct strike, unleashed his Legion on the enemy command structure. Drop pods crashed to the ground, and heavy shuttles deployed Land Raiders and Predators, while armored Space Marines advanced on the defenses.
As the battle raged on, Horus and a Terminator detachment teleported directly to the foot of the great central tower, where they found Urg in a grand chamber accompanied by forty of the biggest orks in his empire. Horus charged forward, slicing through muscled green bodies with his lightning claws, and slowly but surely, they hacked a path through the mob until Horus faced Urg himself. The enormous Overlord was no match for the Primarch’s skill and unnatural power.
The Aftermath
The sudden demise of their mighty leader sent a panic through the Greenskin forces, which fell back from the Terminators into the advancing Luna Wolves and were slaughtered. As word of his death spread, the Overlord’s empire fragmented, and the Imperial forces retook control of the quadrant within a year.
The Triumph of Ullanor
Not long after the battle, the Emperor of Mankind declared that a great Triumph on Ullanor would be held to recognize the glory of the Crusade. Preparation for the Triumph took a considerable effort, with the Adeptus Mechanicus utilizing massive geoformer engines and millions of Servitors, prisoner-slaves, and Thralls to flatten an entire continent and lay down a massive mirror-smooth granite path.
The Triumph itself was a grand spectacle, with 8 million Imperial Army soldiers and thousands of armored vehicles marching along the Granite path in parade formation, followed by hundreds of Titans from the Collegia Titanica, and fourteen Space Marine Legions. Thousands of Imperial Armada aircraft clouded the sky, and Horus was presented as the grand finale of the Triumph.
A New Era
Shocking all present, the Emperor then announced Horus as Warmaster of the Great Crusade and that the Luna Wolves would now be known as the Sons of Horus. He also announced his retirement from the Great Crusade, expecting that the Imperial forces would obey Horus’s commands from then on as if they were his own.
The Road to Disaster
After the Ullanor Crusade, the Imperium believed that the ork race had been broken and could not present a credible threat again. However, this complacency would be suddenly and terribly reversed in M32, when the War of the Beast brought the orks to Terra itself and decimated the Imperium’s entire military. The consequences of the Ullanor Crusade would be felt for centuries to come, setting the stage for one of the darkest periods in human history.
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