Many human mythologies, both ancient and the product of the collapse of civilisation on thousands of worlds during the Age of Strife, carry legends of the apocalyptic wars of the gods in whose aftermath terrible weapons are left upon the desolate battlefield for the gods' inheritors to find. Many scholars liken these legends to the fall of past civilisations and the discovery —or rediscovery— of some pivotal technology such as gunpowder, steel or atomantic force, but never has the mythic construct been more appropriate to the understanding of such a perilous rediscovery than in the case of the gene-craft of Terra. At the height of humanity's ancient dominion during the Dark Age of Technology, unbridled and recklessly potent human science had unlocked the myriad potentials within the human genome and even thought nothing of the terrible crimes of transgenic hybridisation, the fusing of human and alien biology, if it suited the whims of the scientist- kings of that lost age.

許多人類神話中——無(wú)論是古老的傳說(shuō)還是紛爭(zhēng)紀(jì)元中數(shù)以千計(jì)的世界上文明崩潰的產(chǎn)物，都帶有這樣的傳奇故事：眾神之間爆發(fā)了末日之戰(zhàn)，其后果是可怕的武器留在荒涼的戰(zhàn)場(chǎng)上，供眾神的繼承者去尋獲。很多學(xué)者將這些傳說(shuō)比作曾經(jīng)的文明的隕落與某些關(guān)鍵性技術(shù)——比如火藥、鋼鐵或原子能的發(fā)現(xiàn)或者再次發(fā)現(xiàn)的過(guò)程。但是，就泰拉上基因技術(shù)的發(fā)現(xiàn)過(guò)程而言，神話般的概念對(duì)于理解這種危險(xiǎn)的重新發(fā)現(xiàn)（的技術(shù)）是再合適不過(guò)的了。在黑暗科技時(shí)代，人類遠(yuǎn)古統(tǒng)治的頂峰時(shí)期，人類那肆無(wú)忌憚且魯莽強(qiáng)大的科學(xué)已經(jīng)解鎖了人類基因組中的無(wú)數(shù)潛力，他們甚至都不覺(jué)得進(jìn)行轉(zhuǎn)基因雜交配種是可怕罪行，他們將人類與外星人進(jìn)行生物融合，如果它符合那個(gè)失落時(shí)代的科學(xué)家君王們的奇思妙想的話。

The descendants of some of the Dark Age of Technology's more stable flesh-works remain with us to the present in extremes such as the high-gravity adapted Ogryns and the Navigators without whom long-distance space travel would be impossible, while others are mercifully long perished. But when the Dark Age of Technology ended in an apocalypse of war and terror, as the masters fought their creations in the shapes known to us now in legend as the men of stone and the men of steel，?and the anarchy and destruction of widespread psyker emergence brought the dominion of Mankind crashing down, the weapons of the gods were truly left strewn upon the battlefield. Nowhere was this more so than on Terra itself the seat and capital of that ancient empire, and storehouse of its secrets. For centuries such dread secrets slumbered; in forgotten bunkers and armoured vaults lay the masterless gene-looms and autosurgical chambers of the Dark Age of Technology, waiting for the ignorant and the power hungry to set them to work once more to bloody and ill-reckoned purposes. The end result of their inevitable rediscoveries was a world already plunged into violent anarchy and environmental collapse made infinitely worse by the abused powers of those lost gods and devils of ancient science unleashed, genetically tailored viral warfare, desperate schemes at blood-bought immonality and power, and a hulking grotesquery of once-human shock troops driven into battle by the ambition of crazed warlords. Mutation, monstrosity, pogrom, disease and death unimaginable were let loose by the warlords lust for conquest; such was Terra's long night.

在極端情況下，那些仍存在于于我們當(dāng)中的黑暗科技時(shí)代某些更為穩(wěn)定的血肉造物的后裔也會(huì)出場(chǎng)，比如適應(yīng)高重力的歐格林人，還有導(dǎo)航者，沒(méi)有他們的話，長(zhǎng)距離太空旅行將是不可能的，而另一些此類造物已經(jīng)幸運(yùn)地早早死去了。但是，當(dāng)黑暗科技時(shí)代結(jié)束于戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)和恐懼的巨大災(zāi)變當(dāng)中時(shí)，人類與他們的造物交戰(zhàn)——我們?cè)趥髡f(shuō)中稱后者為鐵人和石人，靈能者大量出現(xiàn)也帶來(lái)了毀滅與無(wú)政府狀態(tài)，這一切讓人類的統(tǒng)治土崩瓦解，諸神的武器真的散落在了戰(zhàn)場(chǎng)上。這種現(xiàn)象在泰拉——人類那古老帝國(guó)的首都與所在地是最為明顯的，這個(gè)世界同樣是舊帝國(guó)秘密的儲(chǔ)存?zhèn)}庫(kù)。數(shù)個(gè)世紀(jì)以來(lái)，這些如此可怕的秘密們沉睡著，無(wú)主的基因編織儀器和黑暗科技時(shí)代的自動(dòng)手術(shù)室躺在被遺忘的堡壘與帶有保護(hù)層的地下室中，等待著無(wú)知者與貪圖權(quán)力的人再次為了血腥和無(wú)法預(yù)料的目的而再次開(kāi)啟它們，而它們不可避免的再次發(fā)現(xiàn)也終將以這樣的情形作為最終結(jié)果：古代科技創(chuàng)造出的失落神明與惡魔釋放出被濫用的力量，讓一個(gè)早已陷入暴力無(wú)政府狀態(tài)和環(huán)境崩潰的世界情況變得更加惡化，基因改造的病毒戰(zhàn)，為了進(jìn)行人命堆砌出來(lái)的無(wú)道德戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)和追求權(quán)力而制定的絕望計(jì)劃，由龐大的怪誕造物組成的突擊部隊(duì)被瘋狂軍閥的野心驅(qū)趕進(jìn)入戰(zhàn)場(chǎng)的，而這些怪物曾經(jīng)也是人類。渴求征服的軍閥們釋放出變異，畸形，種族大屠殺，疾病和無(wú)法想象的死亡；泰拉漫長(zhǎng)的舊夜便是如此。

By the time of the coming of the Emperor to finally quell the endless war, splice-wrought and muscle-grafted warriors were the common currency of war amid the techno- barbarian tribes and mercenary clans which dominated much of desolate Ancient Terra, while degenerate gene-damaged mutants and abhumans haunted the ruins and wastes beyond the holdfasts of petty empires. The more extreme children of the Dark Age of Technology were also a fearful legend which haunted, all too real, the dreams of men, be they the Excubari Vivamorphs of Cahmarg, who culled the young for 'beautiful* flesh to graft to their own failing bodies, or the nightmare horrors of the Ghourmant clans of the deep sinks of Detra-Merica, whose terrible strength and longevity were bought only at the price of a far more indiscriminate and insatiable hunger. It was both to break the rule of these foul abominations and the unscrupulous masters of the gene-bred dogs of war, to see them purged from Terra, that the Thunder Legion was created. It was an act of fighting fire with fire. Just as it was that in the creation of the Space Marine Legions was a tool of unparalleled conquest fashioned so that humanity could reclaim the stars. Just as it was that with the Legio Custodes that a body of undying, indefatigable protectors was created, who like watchful demigods of myth would stand guard over the Master of Mankind until the stars burned cold. It was only the Emperor, in His wisdom, who could claim the inheritance of the gene-craft of the Dark Age of Technology, and turn it to these ends, to forge angels of flesh and blood where lesser men had created mutilated monsters and imperfect messiahs. It was only the Emperor who was able to see that relic lore safely contained and truly controlled, so that it might reach its apotheosis in His own works.

當(dāng)?shù)刍实牡絹?lái)最終平息了無(wú)休止的戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)之時(shí)，在針對(duì)那些統(tǒng)治著荒涼的古泰拉大部分土地的科技野蠻人部落和傭兵氏族的戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)中，接受過(guò)拼接定制和肌肉移植的戰(zhàn)士是常見(jiàn)的戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)貨幣，而退化墮落的基因受損變種人和亞人類們則出沒(méi)于那些微小帝國(guó)的要塞之外的廢墟和荒地中。黑暗科技時(shí)代造就的更為極端的產(chǎn)物也是一個(gè)縈繞在人們的夢(mèng)里的太過(guò)真實(shí)的可怕傳說(shuō)：這些人是Cahmarg（機(jī)仆：某個(gè)地名）的活體掠奪者，他們挑選出年輕“美麗”的肉體，將健康的血肉移植到自己衰弱的身體上；或者Detra-Merica污水深坑中高爾曼特氏族那噩夢(mèng)般的恐怖，他們那可怕的力量和長(zhǎng)壽只能以更為不加區(qū)分和貪得無(wú)厭的饑餓為代價(jià)。正是為了打破這些可憎惡物和基因育種的惡犬獸兵的無(wú)恥主人的統(tǒng)治，帝皇創(chuàng)建了雷霆軍團(tuán)來(lái)從泰拉上清除這些怪物。這是一種以毒攻毒的行為，就如同帝皇創(chuàng)造星際戰(zhàn)士是為人類收復(fù)群星提供無(wú)與倫比的征服工具；同樣，帝皇給予禁軍軍團(tuán)不朽的身軀，創(chuàng)造出不屈不撓的保衛(wèi)者，他們就像神話中警惕的半神一樣守衛(wèi)著人類之主，直到群星冷卻。只有帝皇才能以自己的智慧聲稱繼承了黑暗科技時(shí)代的基因技術(shù)，并且用這些技術(shù)來(lái)鑄造血肉的天使——而小人物利用這些技術(shù)創(chuàng)造了殘缺不全的怪物和不完美的救世主。只有帝皇才能看著遺跡知識(shí)被安全地包存和真正地控制住，這樣一來(lái)，這些知識(shí)就有可能在他自己的作品中達(dá)到頂峰。