Grey Knights Supreme Grand Master

"I do not know if daemons feel fear, doubt, or uncertainty in the face of their foes. If anything could elicit such a response in those damned creatures, then surely it would be the Grey Knights."

- Inquisitor Lord Zagthusa Zeist, Ordo Malleus

A Grey Knights Supreme Grand Master is the senior-most Battle-Brother of the Grey Knights Space Marine Chapter. This venerable rank is equivalent to a Chapter Master of other Space Marine Chapters. Also referred to as Chapter Lord, the Supreme Grand Master has complete authority over the rest of the Chapter. However, a Grey Knight can only be appointed as a Supreme Grand Master with the unanimous consent of every other Grey Knight Grand Master, thus ensuring that an unsuitable candidate does not attain dominion over the Chapter.

Role
The life of a Grey Knight is one of sacrifice and duty as he faces the worst horrors of the Warp and sends them screaming back to their foul masters. He will never know peace or respite and he will never know mercy from his enemies, not that a Grey Knight would ever hope for such things. For a Grey Knight, his life only has meaning while in service to the God-Emperor and his deeds only carry weight when undertaken in His name. Should he live long enough, however, and survive the countless trials and struggles against his daemonic foes, he can hope to rise up within the Chapter and take on another mantle, such as that of a Paladin or a Purifier, and be counted as an elite warrior among the Emperor’s elite. For those very few noble warriors that survive the centuries battling upon thousands of worlds, slaying Daemons unnumbered, they may be elevated to the elite rank of Grand Master, each a spiritual heir of one of the eight founding Grand Masters ten millennia ago during the closing days of the Horus Heresy during the Chapter's inception.

The Grey Knights are governed and directed by a Chapter Council consisting of all eight Grand Masters and the Chapter Lord - commonly referred to as the Supreme Grand Master. Such is one of the Grey Knights' oldest traditions, as laid down at the founding by Malcador the Sigillite and his eight recruits. Although the Chapter Lord's rule is absolute, he can only be appointed by the unanimous consent of the Grand Masters, so it is nigh impossible for a reckless or unsuitable candidate to achieve dominion over the Chapter. Each Grand Master holds sway over one of the Chapter's secondary bodies, such as the fleet or the armoury. However, such roles are largely honorary - the organisations in question need little oversight. A Grand Master's chief responsibility is on the battlefield. The Grey Knights are spread thin throughout the galaxy, and it is not always possible for a Brother-Captain to command every strike force. Thus do the Grand Masters take charge of those most crucial of campaigns where even an experienced Brother-Captain is not thought equal to the task. This most commonly happens when one of the Conclave Diabolus - the hundred and one Greater Daemons in which the Grey Knights take special interest- is sighted in the mortal realm.

Wargear

 * Aegis Terminator Armour
 * Iron Halo
 * Nemesis Force Sword
 * Frag Grenades & Krak Grenades
 * Psyk-Out Grenades

Psychic Powers

 * Hammerhand - Focusing the raging power of their minds, Grey Knights can augment their already prodigious might. Even unarmed, such a warrior can crush flesh and bone -- given blade or hammer there is little limit to what they can slay.
 * Psychic Communion - By concentrating his psych1c potential, a Grey Knight commander can make contact with the minds of his fellows, guiding them to the battlefield at the very moment they are needed. Many a battle has been won or lost on such a timely arrival.

Notable Supreme Grand Masters

 * Supreme Grand Master Kaldor Draigo - During the daemonic incursion on the world of Acralem in 799.M41, then-Battle-Brother Draigo fought against M'kar the Reborn and his daemonic army. During a daring assault on the Daemon Prince's fortress, it was Draigo who dealt the deathblow to M'kar, and so cast the daemonic horde back into the Warp, but the Daemon clung to life just long enough to place a vengeful curse upon his slayer. Draigo was acclaimed to the rank of Justicar for his actions on Acralem. Through the next two centuries Draigo continued to serve his Chapter and Emperor with unfailing distinction - earning honours and glory unsurpassed - save perhaps by the Grey Knights first Supreme Grand Master, Janus. Two hundred years to the day since Draigo's victory the Grey Knights received an astropathic beacon bringing news to Titan that Acralem had once again been invaded by M'kar and his Daemon army. Forbidding his Chapter to involve themselves, Lord Draigo undertook the burden of facing M'kar himself. Upon the pinnacle of Shadow Peak, before the swirling Warp rift from which the Daemon Prince drew his unholy power, the two adversaries faced one another, once again. Draigo managed to deliver M'kar a fateful death blow with the broken blade of his Nemesis force weapon. But Draigo's ultimate victory was robbed from him as the Daemon Prince cast the Grey Knight into the collapsing Warp rift. Since that time, Draigo has been cursed to the hell of being doomed to walk within the Realm of Chaos, unable to escape. But when there is a Daemonic incursion in the material universe, and a Daemon Prince draws power from the Warp, Draigo is once again drawn back into the material realm. Reunited with his Chapter temporarily, Draigo fights alongside his fellow Grey Knights once again. But their victory is always a hollow one, as Lord Draigo is once again drawn back into the Warp. The fortitude of character that Draigo possesses to endure this half-life is unheard of, yet endures he does. He continues to walk the Realm of Chaos still, continuing his eternal battle against the Chaos Gods. But there is still hope, that while Draigo still lives, he will one day yet prevail and return to be reunited with his Chapter.
 * Supreme Grand Master Orias - Lord Orias was brought low in the 39th Millennium by the Daemon Prince and Plague Lord Herperitus. Mortally wounded but still alive, Lord Orias was interred within a Dreadnought and continues to serve the Chapter to this day.
 * Supreme Grand Master Aeneas - Lord Aeneas lead the Chapter for 55 standard years during the 37th Millennium before he was mortally wounded by the Chaos Sorcerer Ahriman of the Thousand Sons Traitor Legion and was interred within a Dreadnought.