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Return to the Grostiche Mountains

Years ago the Grostiche Mountains seemed to swallow up an entire detachment of the Cadian 101^st who dared to walk its haunted crevasse and fog layered valleys. To this day farmers and Grox Herders still speak of hearing disembodied screams and seeing phantoms on the mountainside. Nothing of the dead guardsmen was ever found save for blood stained patches of snow and wrecked Chimeras.

These stories did little to impress or restrain the Sisters of the Order of the Exalted Heart, the so-called Ladies of Pain, as the civilians of Cygnus knew them. They heard tale of heretical shrines and antediluvian cities buried in the snow and ice. The idea that such blasphemous sites could exist on world belonging to the divine and beneficent Emperor of Mankind was abhorrent to them. It could not be allowed and it was by holy edict that the Canoness Preceptor of the Order dispatched her most zealous and hateful battle sisters to carry out the will of the Emperor.

Deep within the mountain range where travel became nearly impossible and all signs of distant civilization were lost to the horizon is where they found their destination. A temple complex that rested beside a frozen lake. Some evidence still stood of more recent human civilization. The Logi of the Order dated the remains of the bunker to a time before the Light of the Emperor graced this world, when men and women lived in ignorance of the Imperium.

It took the Expedition’s Canoness only a few moments to realize what must be done, that this place must be cleansed with Holy Promethium and sanctified Exorcist Missiles. She prepared her battle sisters and tanks to roll into the darkness within the temple complex.

As they neared the dark arch of the entrance the ground behind them quivered and seized from below. The ice spilt and the snow was pushed aside. Frost covered metal specters rose from an age old slumber, each one carrying abominable weapons that cast their sickly emerald glare on the snow drifts around them.

The Canoness rallied her sisterhood and ministered the hymns of battle and gave praise to the Emperor for allow them to serve his holiness. With shouts of holy hatred and cruel spite the sisters mounted their Repressors and sped toward the enemy as fast as their blessed engines would carry them. The night flickered brightly with the flash of Exorcist Missiles and the organ music of those vehicles played by organists who were oblivious to the battle unfolding around them. Only their music occupied their thoughts now.

The enemy was not impressed by the blind zealotry of their opponent. They felt no fear, they felt nothing at all. Most were barely self-aware and even the rare few that had some sense of self only knew rage and jealousy. The living mocked them with every breath, with every sensation and experience. They advanced as a solid block, each one moving without issuing so much as a single sound let alone a battle cry. The only evidence of their presence at all was he crunch of snow beneath their metal bulk and the pale light of the moons reflecting off their living metal. Beside their implacable advance a ghostly image crawled into sight from he depths of the void. A pyramid of blackish stone with veins of glowing jade that ran its faces. The zenith of the monolith burst into baleful life and unleashed a whip of energy that brought silence to the battlefield. The organ of the Exorcist was destroyed and with it the musician.

The Canoness ordered her mounted warriors on while she and her Retributors took shelter behind the damaged Exorcist. With a defiant scream she ordered her Immolator forward as well but as it reached the edge of the frozen lake the ice gave way and the tracks were jammed with freezing water and snow. Her once strong position had become nothing but a series of road blocks and places to conceal herself. She spat litanies of defiance and condemnation but her prayers halted as her eyes fixed on the conductor of the silent Necron advance.

Clothed in a black shroud and tabard that moved more like smoke then cloth, the Lord stood with his hulking Immortals. One hand clutched an orb that pulsed with wicked energy and each burst of light would awaken another fallen warrior. In one smooth motion it raised its icon of office, staff made of elegant metal and light. As it did so the rest of its army followed suit in jerky mechanical fashion. By its silent command the enemy fired and anything its weapons touched was rent down to ash, stripped layer by layer… flayed alive. Within the death mask of the Lord there were glints of witch fire that burned with a hate more ancient then any mortal could conjure. The Canoness was humbled by its fiery gaze. She knew that even in death it held more rage then she could ever muster in her living years.

The mounted sisters rolled into a flanking position and leapt from their Repressors with bolters blazing and litanies of faith on their lips. The Canoness ordered her Seraphim to descend upon the enemy’s other flank and her own Retributors to stab into the core of the enemy with blessed Heavy Bolters.

The sisters never faltered or fled in the face of the enemy but their fire power was futile. Every shot was shrugged off or repelled by the alien armor and those that did succumb to fire would soon stand, willed back to unlife by their grim master. Their only victory came when a burst of heavy fire forced silent gliding Necron weapon platforms to retreat into the depths. Beside the retreat of these five their weapons could only manage to put down another four of the Necron. By that time enemy had destroyed all resistance on both flanks and its indestructible Monolith drifted forward to block the view of the Retributors.

All was lost to them. The Canoness gave the command to fall back, though her options for escape were all cut off save for one, the depths of the benighted temple-city they came to destroy. Her and the survivors walked willingly into the blackness of the archways. None of them had any illusions about surviving the night. Their only hope now was to die well in His service.

Game Type: Annihilation

Deployment Pitched Battle

Game Size: 1500

Result: Cygnus Tomb Victory 4KP to 2KP