Jorun Retaliation

The Jorun Retalion was a an Imperial campaign prosecuted by the Howling Griffons Space Marine Chapter against the treachery of General Jorun of the 15th Heraklon Ironclads in 109.M41. This entire Imperial battle group that should have been on its way to reinforce the lines of the Gothic War instead turned traitor, slaughtered their commissariat attachments and went renegade. The Imperium moved to act with decisive force as the foul taint of the Xenos known as the Dark Eldar was found to be at the root cause of this perfidy, with Jorun and his personal cadre laid low and corrupted by addiction to the aliens' foul psychotropics and depraved practices, thanks to the dark arts of the Cabal of the Crimson Libation. The humans were no more than disposable tools used by the Dark Eldar to enslave planetary populations by treachery and brute force, and with little risk to the aliens themselves. This could not remain unpunished, and the retaliation force the Imperium launched was fully intended to smash the Heraklons and their dark allies with brutal and overwhelming power, annihilating them without regard or mercy.

The combined taskforce was comprised of the Howling Griffons Chapter (then about eight companies in effective strength) who were given overall command, and reinforced with supporting companies from the Ultramarines and the Sons of Orar Chapters. The traitor guard was intercepted as they made planetfall on the Feral World of Asturia. Caught unprepared for such a fierce counter-assault over 5,000 renegade guardsmen died in the first hour of the ferocious Space Marine attack, torn apart on their landing zones with much of their heavy yet to be unlimbered. As the battle was joined in full, the task of destroying the Traitor command fell to the Howling Griffons 4th Battle Company who executed a Drop Pod assault into the heart of the disoriented enemy. Confronting not only the elite of General Jorun's Ogryn cadre, but also the inhumanly lithe and cruel forms of the Dark Eldar that rose around him, the Howling Griffons despatched them with bolter shell, fire and unshadeable resolve. It was Chaplain Armand Titus who fought his way to the traitor general and delivered the Emperor's judgement despite suffering grievous wounds tainted with vile poisons, cleaving Jorun's skull in half with his Crozius Arcanum. He would later be enshrined with all due reverence within a Dreadnought sarcophagus, in order to continue his service to his Chapter. The traitors' morale was collapsed with the death of their leader and the swift desertion of their foul Xenos allies that followed. The disordered and panicking Heraklons were ruthlessly hunted down and slain in the aftermatch; with the renegade forces utterly wiped out within six hours of the battle's opening salvos.