Unheeded Heroes

Some Loyalist forces pledged themselves to defend individual worlds against the depredations of the Traitors, in particular if they found themselves stranded by the coming of the Ruinstorm and unable to penetrate its depths. History can never make a full accounting of the number of?such actions fought by stoic and self-sacrificing Loyalists far from the main war zones; indeed, only they and possibly those they protected will ever know of the sacrifices made. Recently surfaced is a rare account of?such an action - the Defence of?Nagathar, where several scattered Legiones Astartes forces sought refuge in a pocket of relative calm against the suddenly tempestuous Warp. Not all of?these groups were loyal to Terra though, for one belonged to the Legiones Astartes Word Bearers and was somehow able to navigate the surrounding warp routes and avoid the horrendous calamities that had befallen so many other vessels attempting to do so. Nagathar itself remained untouched as the storms swallowed nearby worlds, but the Word Bearers sought to prey upon its scattered settlements and enslave its peoples, and it was only the efforts of?the Loyalists of the Imperial Fists and Dark Angels that saved a million souls from being sacrificed by the sons of?Lorgar for an end that no sane man would attempt to perceive.

在黑暗年代中，某些忠誠派部隊(duì)自己會保衛(wèi)某些單獨(dú)的世界，令其免造叛軍的掠奪破壞，尤其是在他們發(fā)現(xiàn)自己受困于毀滅風(fēng)暴的到來，并且無法深度穿越亞空間的情況下。至于堅(jiān)忍且富有自我犧牲的忠誠者們在那些遠(yuǎn)離主要戰(zhàn)區(qū)的戰(zhàn)場上執(zhí)行過的此類任務(wù)的數(shù)量，歷史學(xué)家們從未完全統(tǒng)計(jì)過。最近就有一份關(guān)于此類行動的罕見報(bào)告被披露出來——Nagathar防御戰(zhàn)，此戰(zhàn)中有數(shù)支破碎的阿斯塔特軍團(tuán)部隊(duì)在這個(gè)相對平靜的世界上尋求避難，以避免被混亂狂暴的亞空間現(xiàn)象所傷害。但并非所有到達(dá)此地的部隊(duì)都忠于泰拉，一支屬于懷言者阿斯塔特軍團(tuán)的部隊(duì)能通過某種（未知）方式在周邊亞空間航線中導(dǎo)航，避免了發(fā)生在許多其他試圖這樣做的船只上的可怕災(zāi)難。在亞空間風(fēng)暴吞噬了周邊世界的同時(shí)，Nagathar本身卻仍未受到波及，但懷言者們試圖掠奪星球上分散的定居點(diǎn)并奴役當(dāng)?shù)厝嗣?，全憑帝國之拳和黑暗天使軍團(tuán)的努力，一百萬人的靈魂得到了拯救，否則他們將被珞珈的子嗣們獻(xiàn)祭以換取一個(gè)任何理智的人都不會試圖去感知的結(jié)果。

Other Legiones Astartes ranged for thousands of light years across the galaxy, braving the perils of the storm-wracked Warp in an effort to engage the enemy wherever they were to be found. Of this type of action there exist more examples than others, but many are known to us only by hearsay alone. The names of some of these groups appear in accounts of battles the length and breadth of the galaxy, making it nigh- impossible for historators to compile a true or complete accounting of their deeds. One name that is known however is Roscius, an Assault-Captain of the Legiones Astartes Ultramarines who had been assigned pathfinder duties ahead of the doomed 933rd Expeditionary Fleet by his Primarch soon after Roboute Guilliman assumed command of?the Legion——Assault-Captain Roscius is not listed amongst those officers ordered to muster at the Calth Conjunction.

其他阿斯塔特軍團(tuán)在分布中銀河系中數(shù)千光年的范圍中，他們冒著風(fēng)險(xiǎn)勇敢穿越被風(fēng)暴破壞摧殘的亞空間，努力在任何地方與他們找到的敵人交戰(zhàn)。相比于其他類型的行動，此類行動存在更多的案例，但我們所知道的也僅僅是傳聞而已。某些部隊(duì)的名稱甚至出現(xiàn)在了某些遠(yuǎn)度和廣度遍布銀河的戰(zhàn)斗記錄中，這使得歷史學(xué)家們幾乎不可能對他們的事跡進(jìn)行真實(shí)或完整的統(tǒng)計(jì)。在這些戰(zhàn)士中，我們已知的一個(gè)名字是勞西烏斯，他是一位極限戰(zhàn)士軍團(tuán)突擊連長。在羅伯特 基里曼接手軍團(tuán)指揮后不久，他就被原體派往注定遭受毀滅的第933遠(yuǎn)征艦隊(duì)前方承擔(dān)尋路者職責(zé)——被命令前往考斯集結(jié)點(diǎn)進(jìn)行集合的軍官名單中并不包含突擊連長勞西烏斯。

Several months after the outset of the Shadow Crusade against Ultramar, Roscius' assault company boarded and captured a strike cruiser of the Legiones Astartes Sons of Horus at Plutol, a segmentum away from Ultramar. Six weeks later, that cruiser ambushed and crippled a Death Guard heavy transport at Terrax out-system and a month after that conducted a lightning strike against a Traitor Mechanicum void fuelling station at Yspotua. The cruiser does not appear in any extant historical archives for the next year, but resurfaces when it is reported to have led a ragged flotilla of vessels?against Traitor supply lines at Toreus, 3000 light years away where Assault-Captain Roscius commanded a force of over 3,000 Legionaries drawn from as many as four different Legions. The last engagement where Roscius is known to have commanded was the Duthovan Blockade, conducted against Traitor forces stranded on Duthovan by the coming of the Ruinstorm, a battle few of either side survived.

在暗影遠(yuǎn)征在奧特拉瑪星區(qū)爆發(fā)數(shù)個(gè)月之后，勞西烏斯的突擊連隊(duì)在Plutol跳幫并俘獲了一艘荷魯斯之子軍團(tuán)打擊巡洋艦，此地并不位于奧特拉瑪所在的極限星域。六周后，這艘巡洋艦在Terrax恒星系外環(huán)區(qū)域伏擊并重創(chuàng)了死亡守衛(wèi)軍團(tuán)的重型運(yùn)輸艦。在此事件一個(gè)月之后，這艘船對機(jī)械教叛軍位于Yspotua的虛空燃料補(bǔ)給站發(fā)動了閃電突襲。在之后的一年中，這艘巡洋艦未出現(xiàn)于任何現(xiàn)存的歷史檔案中，但當(dāng)它再次出現(xiàn)時(shí)，報(bào)告聲稱這艘巡洋艦率領(lǐng)一支破舊的艦隊(duì)在位于3000光年之外的Toreus攻擊了叛軍的補(bǔ)給線，突擊連長勞西烏斯率領(lǐng)的則是一支由來自四個(gè)不同軍團(tuán)的3000多名軍團(tuán)戰(zhàn)士組成的部隊(duì)。已知勞西烏斯指揮的最后一次戰(zhàn)役是Duthovan封鎖戰(zhàn)，他率軍進(jìn)攻了被毀滅風(fēng)暴困在Duthovan世界的叛軍部隊(duì)，雙方幾乎都無人從戰(zhàn)斗中幸存。

Lorgar's invocation of the Ruinstorm had cut the galaxy asunder, and so most Legiones Astartes forces not operating under the personal command of their Primarch were often required to act under their own cognisance for extended periods, in many cases for the entirety of the Horus Heresy and long after. The Ruinstorm did not serve only to stymie the coordination of far-flung armies, but had a more unsettling effect born?of the dark powers underpinning the entire conflict. Even though it existed primarily in the other-dimension of warp space, the Ruinstorm bled through into realspace in many regions, the raw stuff of the Immaterium tainting the void itself with coiling setheric tendrils and kaleidoscopes of?unseen colours. From the surface of many worlds, the stars appeared to have been swallowed by the void or the night skies were transformed into a canvas upon which were rendered scenes from the hells of ancient superstitious texts. On the worst afflicted worlds, nightmares made flesh walked the lands, the veil between reality and the Immaterium stretched beyond breaking point and the infernal denizens first encountered by the Ultramarines at Calth —named by some 'Daemons'— spewing forth. Thus, in many cases, it was the smaller, detached Legiones Astartes forces that first encountered such abominations as they fought far from the key war zones, prosecuting isolated wars against creatures that defied all sanity and had no place in the secular Imperium the Great Crusade had founded upon the bedrock of Imperial Truth.

珞珈召喚毀滅風(fēng)暴的舉動使銀河系變得四分五裂，所以大多數(shù)沒有受到原體本人親自指揮的阿斯塔特軍團(tuán)部隊(duì)通常都會被（指揮官）要求按照他們自己的認(rèn)知行動很久，在某些情況中，這種現(xiàn)象（甚至）在整場荷魯斯叛亂與內(nèi)戰(zhàn)結(jié)束很久之后都還在持續(xù)著。毀滅風(fēng)暴阻礙了遠(yuǎn)方部隊(duì)之間的協(xié)調(diào)，而且支持整場沖突的黑暗力量也產(chǎn)生了更令人不安的影響。盡管它主要存在于亞空間（所處）的另一個(gè)維度中，但毀滅風(fēng)暴仍然在許多地方撕開裂口侵入現(xiàn)實(shí)宇宙，來自非物質(zhì)宇宙的原始生猛之物用卷曲的卷須和看不見的顏色的千變?nèi)f化形態(tài)污染了虛空本身。從許多世界的地表上來看，星辰似乎被虛空所吞沒，或者夜空變成了畫布，其上描繪了古代迷信文本中的地獄場景。在受影響最為嚴(yán)重的世界上，噩夢讓血肉行走于大地之上，現(xiàn)實(shí)宇宙和非物質(zhì)宇宙之間的紗幕延伸到了斷裂點(diǎn)，極限戰(zhàn)士們在考斯首次遇到的地獄居民——有些人稱之為“惡魔”——奔涌而出。所以在很多情況中，第一次遇到這種可憎的生物的都是是規(guī)模較小的獨(dú)立阿斯塔特軍團(tuán)軍團(tuán)，因?yàn)樗麄冊谶h(yuǎn)離主要戰(zhàn)區(qū)的地方作戰(zhàn)。它們對這些亞空間生物進(jìn)行孤獨(dú)的惡戰(zhàn)，而后者否認(rèn)所有理智，在大遠(yuǎn)征中建立于帝國真理基石上的世俗帝國內(nèi)沒有一席之地。

By 010.M31, the Imperium that had been stood no more. The fires of the Horus Heresy were consuming hundreds of systems in all- out war, while innumerable conflicts burned in the darkness for beyond the central war zones.

到了010.M31，曾經(jīng)屹立不倒的人類帝國已經(jīng)不復(fù)存在了。荷魯斯叛亂的戰(zhàn)火在這場全面戰(zhàn)爭中吞噬了數(shù)百個(gè)恒星系，而在中心戰(zhàn)區(qū)之外的黑暗虛空中，無數(shù)沖突的戰(zhàn)火也在熊熊燃燒。