Forsworn

The Forsworn is a Traitor Legion of Chaos Space Marines whose infamy matches, if not overshadows, that of the other Traitor Legions, and whose name is only muttered in whispers and curses all across the Galaxy. Despite not being a true Legion like their kindred, the Forsworn are the mightiest of them all; united under the rule of the dreaded Mordreth. Tired of the infighting that gripped the Traitor Legions for centuries since the death of Quetzlculhuacan, the Warmaster forcibly united the lost, the damned and the renegade into a whole new Legion; replacing their old ties with the Ashen Oath. The Forsworn are always brought together in great numbers whenever the will of their Warmaster of Chaos demands it. Whenever the entirety of the Forsworn is called to battle, it marks the beginning of a dark time for the Galaxy.

Through his actions, Mordreth re-invigorated the Traitors, reviving the old notion that none could stand in their way and that they would one day inherit the galaxy itself. When the warbands of the Forsworn gather under the wrathful banner of Mordreth the Warmaster, their battle cry is ever heard upon their lips -- let the galaxy burn.

The Dark Times
To understand the origins of the Forsworn, one must look back to the Galaxy shattering events of the Schism when the Tyrant Emperor, who had lost his compassion and humanity, proclaimed Himself a God and sought to replace the Imperial Truth with His Cult. Either by true devotion or by oath, many of the Legions converted to this new Cult while those of a more cynical mindset either stalled or outright resisted. But the Tyrant Emperor would not tolerate dissent and declared those He believed disloyal as heretics, unleashing his newly converted fanatics upon them; the first of these blows striking over Luna where He attempted to destroy the Silent Sisterhood and the Centurions of Oblivion in an ambush. With this, the Tyrant Emperor plunged the Imperium into civil war where His Loyalists fought against the Reforged; those who still believed in the Imperial Truth. However, unbeknownst to all, the dark claws of Chaos had already sunken deep into the souls of several Legions, and so it came to pass at the infamous Battle of Mithran, Loyalist and Reforged alike were slaughtered by those they thought to be close allies. On that battlefield, surrounded by corpses of betrayed brothers, Quetzlculhuacan of the Jaguar Warriors stood before D'Jal of the Talons of Leccenus, Agnarak of the Judges, Neviniral of the Red Sons, Neamhni of the Seers of the Abyss and Faramarz Darvishi Zareii of the Absolvers; and declared his ascendancy as Warmaster of Chaos.

The ensuing civil war pitched the whole Imperium into anarchy and chaos. The Imperial Army was fractured, regiment fighting regiment and ﬂeet fighting ﬂeet. The Titan Legions of the Mechanicum were equally affected, and soon the entirety of the Emperor's hosts were engaged in bitter conﬂict between Loyalist, Reforged and Chaos. Barely a single world was untouched by a war that accounted for countless billions of lives and that culminated in the final battle on Terra itself.

As events neared their tragic conclusion, the Reforged launched an all out assault on Terra. For five days, they fought; spilling tides of blood as the Reforged battled their way into the Palace. Eventually one Primarch reached the Tyrant Emperor and, in his final moments, struck Him with the anathame and returned the Emperor's humanity to Him. Alas, at that moment, the Heretics burst through the warp; pouring into the Imperial Palace. The Traitor Legionaries were a far cry from the noble Astartes they once were; rife with warp taint and fighting beside mutants and daemons alike while the Primarchs, had shed their physical bodies and became daemonic monstrosities. With this corrupted horde at his back, not even the Custodes could stop Quetzlculhuacan from reaching the Emperor and engaging Him in a titanic duel before the Golden Throne. The Emperor, drained by the realisation of what He had done, could not stand against the empowered Warmaster and was struck down. All would've been lost in that moment had the Emperor not made one final sacrifice in atonement for His tyranny and mustered up every shred of his power to unleash a psychic blast on Quetzlculhuacan; utterly annihilating his soul. The death of the Warmaster broke the Forces of Chaos, sending them into a retreat. They fled to the only place they could; the Eye of Terror.

As for the Imperium, the restoration of the Emperor could not simply undo almost a decade of war and the Reforged were driven off Terra by the vengeful Loyalists; who entombed their God on his Golden Throne, unaware of the Emperor's psychic pleas to end His life. The Reforged fled to their holdings where they founded Imperium Secundus on the capital world of Nova Terra. The Imperium was now divided, both sides too weak to wage anything beyond a cold war. For now, however, they knew peace from Chaos.

Legions Divided
Escaping the wrath of a vengeful Imperium, the Traitors fled deep into the Eye of Terror; where the pressures of their new surroundings quickly set in. The Primarchs were quickly caught up in the Great Game of their Gods, dragging their Legions into another war. The Talons' of Leccenus thirst for blood drove them into a frenzy, attacking the worlds of their former allies, to claim skulls for their master. The Red Sons fractured into pieces when Neviniral was slain in a duel against Zakarah, burying their grief by raiding others for slaves and loot. The Judges, no longer bound to a Warmaster, remained largely united in their insane Primarch's quest to rid the Galaxy of its greatest crime: life, starting with the Legions they fought aside for years. The Seers of the Abyss delved deeper into their insane studies, launching attacks on the other Legions to glean every scrap of knowledge they could find. The Absolvers' fanaticism only grew inside the home of their Gods and battled those they deemed unworthy of the Primordial Truth's notice.

As for the Jaguar Warriors, the Arch Traitors, Quetzlculhuacan's failure to bring victory resulted in his sons becoming the target for the Traitors' anger. Thus it was the Jaguar Warriors who bore the brunt of the Legion Wars. And so it came to pass for centuries to come that the Traitor Legions tore each other apart, breaking into smaller warbands as their Primarchs ascended higher and higher into the Great Game.

From the Ashes
Ever since the Traitor Legions splintered, warbands of Chaos Space Marines stalked the Eye of Terror's currents in their hunt for lost Imperial ships and other warbands. On occasion, these warbands would band together to take out a large foe before inevitably falling upon each other until the cycle began anew. Across the Warp planets burned in the fires of bitter warfare and only the bloodied ash would remain. Worlds such as Skalathrax, Maleum and Sicarus became infamous for the wars raged on their surfaces. Whispers speak that skulls cover every inch of Skalathrax while the ruined citadels of Maleum are dead silent after a century of warfare and of Sicarius few dare to speak of what atrocities raged there for even the most insane worshipers of Chaos have their limits. Millions of bones were crushed beneath the feet of renegade, Astartes and Traitor Titans with no cause to fight for other than to bury themselves in the ever rising piles of ash the warp was becoming.

And yet... something would rise from these ashes.

Erlon was an unassuming world; just another victim of a war among wars. Yet a large number of warbands came there anyway, some to pick out the scraps of battles while others came to start the fight anew. But their reasons were for nought as they discovered something most unusual amongst the ash. One structure stood intact amongst the ruins and inside was a room, simple in nature and design. In there was a lit fire and sitting before it on a chair of wood was a man, a Heretic Astartes, where no icon nor colour adorned his ash coated armour.