The Legio Mordaxis ("Deathdealers") is a Traitor Titan Legion of the Dark Mechanicum in the service of Chaos. Hailing from an unknown world cloaked in a toxic atmosphere, the Deathdealers weathered the Age of Strife within environmentally sealed manufactoria, emerging to eradicate all who trespassed upon their world.
Throughout the Great Crusade the Deathdealers were closely associated with the Word Bearers Legion, a partnership that ultimately led to their corruption. In the year preceding the Horus Heresy, the Dark Apostles of the Legiones Astartes Word Bearers infested the god-engines of the Deathdealers with a deadly techno-toxin, their very presence corrupting and decaying all those around them.
Legion History
Legio Mordaxis Titan Legio Colour Scheme.
The Legio Mordaxis were once a Loyalist Legio of the Adeptus Titanicus, created sometime before the tumultuous era of the Age of Strife. Hailing from a highly toxic world, during this troubled era the Legio weathered the constant warp storms and ravages of the deadly environment of their home world beneath the protective barriers of environmentally sealed manufactoria. They only emerged to eradicate those that would dare encroach upon their home world, wiping any threat that dare assail it. Once they were rediscovered by the Imperial Expeditionary Fleets of the Great Crusade and brought into the Imperial fold, the Legio Mordaxis deployed alongside several Legions of the Legiones Astartes, most notably the Word Bearers Legion, at the forward edge of the Great Crusade.
Legio Mordaxis had been pure and loyal soldiers in the Emperor's armies during the Great Crusade. On the eve of the Heresy, they were brought low by a malevolent machine plague devised by the Dark Mechanicum and unleashed by the Dark Apostles of the Word Bearers. This techno-virus infected the Legion's Princeps, stripping them of their will and individuality until they remained as little more than puppets slaved to the will of their Titans' corrupted machine spirits. Horgoth Nyr, Princeps Maximus of the Legio Infernus (Fire Masters) callously exploited the weaknesses of his allies, manipulating them into sending a measure of their Legios to aid the Traitor Primarchs, so that he might engage in the true business of bringing the Five Hundred Worlds to their knees.
Accurate records of Legio Mordaxis Titans following their declaration for the Warmaster remain elusive, for their very presence corrupted any machines they came into contact with. Testimonies extracted from Solar Auxilia detachments after the Siege of Castra Tanagra speak of a Deathdealers Titan bearing the weathered colours of Legio Mordaxis, one of which matched the description of the Reaver-class Titan Irkalla. Once honoured for its past deeds during assault upon the Fortress of the Illucidian Barons, the god-engine that walked upon Talassar was profoundly different, each step ponderous and heavy, as weighed down by the corruption that had taken root within it.
Notable Campaigns
- Shadow Crusade (007-008.M31) - In the wake of the disastrous Battle of Calth, the Word Bearers and the World Eaters Legions, along with the Legio Mordaxis, Legio Infernus (Fire Masters) and Legio Audax (Ember Wolves), launched the Shadow Crusade against the Realm of Ultramar, bringing ruin and despair to the Five Hundred Worlds. Loyalist forces fought back fiercely, but were often outnumbered or outgunned, and often taken by surprise by those they once counted as allies.
- Crusade of Iron (ca. 008-010.M31) - In response to the Traitor Legions' assault across the Five Hundred Worlds, the Loyalists within the region declare the Crusade of Iron. Spearheaded by the Titans of the Legio Praesagius, they led their allies from the Legio Oberon, Legio Lysanda and dozens of Imperial Knight Households to isolate the Traitor forces and slaughter them piecemeal. The Legio Mordaxis would take part in a number of notable campaigns against the Loyalists during this particular Crusade.
- Defence of Tyros (ca. 008.M31) - During the Defence of Tyros, a new and terrible ally of Legio Praesagius entered the fray. Unheralded, black armoured Psi-Titans of the Ordo Sinister appeared on the battlefield. Like a giant apparition of death, the Warlord Titan Occedentalis-Eurytus spread dismay and ruin among the Titans of Legio Mordaxis and the Knights of House Ærthegn. Supported by only a handful of Loyalist Knights and Titans, the Psi-Warlord infected Knight Scions and Titan Princeps with visions of despair and defeat. Their vox-net crippled, and their commanders imprisoned by their own doubts, the Traitor forces become easy prey for the Loyalists, who drove them from the cities of Tyros and hunted them across the world's vast Alkaline Badlands.
- Purging of Haverlund (ca. 008.M31) - During the Purging of Haverlund, the Sons of Konor made their re-appearance during the ongoing conflict. This was an alliance of Blackshield Knight Households comprised of minor Knight Households from the Eastern Marches tha had been turned away by lords who pledged their strength to neither Emperor nor Warmaster. Some did not even give reason for their disobedience, or observe even the smallest measure of respect for the Forge World of Gantz, the home world of Legio Praesagius, when summoned. Fighting under the command of the Blackshield Knight known as the Crownless King, these Knights sought independence from both the Warmaster and the Imperium. After Haverlund's fall into rebellion, the Crownless King and his Households began a long campaign to free it from its traitorous masters. This culminated in the Battle for Victory Plaza, which saw scortes of Knights fight to bring down the Legio Mordaxis Warlord Titan Noctis Sanguinia and its Axiom maniple.
- Dark Waters (ca. 009.M31) - Despite their defeat on Espandor, the Loyalist Titan Legions eroded the strength of their enemies across the Five Hundred Worlds. The Legio Mordaxis, the Traitor Titan Legion that had been transformed by the machinations of the Word Bearers Legion, were charged by their Legio Infernus allies to hunt down and destroy Mechanicum forces across the western regions of the Realm of Ultramar. Here, their spies came to the fore and, following reports from Traitors among the Loyalist ranks, the Legio Mordaxis fleet sailed for the remote water world of Zarathusa Secundus. The people of this isolated world existed on floating cities, whose ancient technologies farmed the planet's geothermal wealth. The Loyalists had recently pacified an uprising sparked by Dark Mechanicum cells on the planet, and the aftermath of that war was still evident throughout its shallow seas. The Traitors commenced their attack as the Loyalist forces, commanded by Princeps Tesarius Solomere Krane of Legio Lysanda, aboard his Reaver-class Titan, Purantum Bellos, awaited extraction upon the principal landmass of Zarathusa, known as the Aquila Atoll. The Traitors seized control of both the planet's orbit and the Loyalist vox-net, masquerading as loyal servants of the Imperium until the trap was sprung. As landers approached the surface of Zarathusa, they revealed themselves not as the intended extraction ships but rather transports carrying the Titans of the Legio Mordaxis. Desperate to deny the atoll to the invaders, Legio Lysanda and the Imperial Knights of House Vornherr scrambled to form an effective defence, aware that retreat was not an option without abandoning those ground forces unable to wade through the seas of Zarathusa; seas that turned black as the battle raged and toxins that had ravaged the Legio Mordaxis polluted the ground they walked upon. Despite their valiant efforts, the Loyalist forces were led into a cunningly laid trap by the Dark Mechanium allies of the Legio Mordaxis. Much later, the Loyalists would learn the fate of Zarathusa Secundus and its defenders, though not before the corrupted remains of the Purantum Bellos was encountered on Drooth II, along with the blackened Knight armours of dozens of House Vornherr scions, now enslaved to the Legio Mordaxis machine curse. As the war raged on, the devastation it left in its wake increased the intensity of the storms and the frequency of the tidal waves that tore across the land, even as techno-toxins flowing from wounded Legio Mordaxis Titans left a permanent stain upon the world's ecosystem.
Combat Doctrine
The Princeps of the Legio Mordaxis exist in a world of constant torment, linked as they are to a god-engine ravaged by disease, forging them into lumbering behemoths nigh-immune to pain. Many of these Princeps have welcomed the changes wrought upon them, accepting every "blessing" offered. Though they have broken many oaths, the Princeps still believes in the strength of brotherhood.
Legion Specific Wargear
- Toxin Nodes - The Dark Mechanicum engineered methods for exploiting the internal corruption of the Deathdealers' Titans into their weapons, enabling them to spit forth disease.
Notable Titans
- Mark of Ruin (Warlord-class Titan) - The Mark of Ruin was a Warlord Titan command by Princeps Senoris Hakoth Rul, who led the Legio Mordaxis during Battle of Zarathusa Secundus. The ultimate fate of Mark of Ruin is unknown.
- Noctis Sanguinia (Warlord-class Titan) - The Noctis Sanguinia was a Warlord Titan that led an Axiom maniple of various Titans of the Legio Mordaxis during the early campaigns of the Horus Heresy. Unfortunately, it would meet its end at the hands of the Sons of Konor, a force comprised of Blackshield Knights, upon the world of Haverlund during the Battle for Victory Plaza. With scores of Knights, the Sons of Konor brought down the mighty Legio Mordaxis Warlord Titan and its fellow Traitor Titans.
- Sin-eater (Warlord-class Titan) - Sin-eater was a notable Warlord Titan of the Deathdealers that had last been seen during the conquest of Hnudiax in the year 999.M30, and would not be seen again until the invasion of Zarathusa Secundus in 009.M31. The changes wrought upon the Legio Mordaxis were plain to see upon its form, oily fluid seeping from its joints with every step. As Sin-eater strode towards the Aquila Atoll, the water around it blackened, that taint harboured within the Titan corrupting all around it. More troubling still were the sorrowful cries that echoes from the Titan when attempts were made to hail it, the Princeps of Sin-eater consumed by eternal agony, now enslaved by the machine curse unleashed upon the Titan Legion by their Word Bearers allies.
- Irkalla (Reaver-class Titan) - Irkalla was a formerly loyalist Reaver Titan that became corrupted by the techno curse enacted by his Legio's allies from the Word Bearers. Once lauded for its honourable service during the Great Crusade, when it was once against encountered during the subsequent campaigns of the Horus Heresy, it had been became a cursed revenant war-engine that corrupted the very ground it trod upon. Its ultimate fate following the Horus Heresy is unknown.
Notable Legion Personnel
- Princeps Senioris Hakoth Rul - Commanded the Warlord-class Titan Mark of Ruin during the Battle of Zarathusa Secundus. The machine disease that infected him pumped through his MIU into the god-engine. There was little left of the man Rul had once been, the black blood of his cursed Titan having turned him into an extension of its dark machine spirit. Rul only desired the destruction of his enemies and to spread the machine curse carried by his Legion. This was why his Titans pushed their reactors even as they were descending on Zarathusa, and vented their corruption plasma into the seas, the black liquid infecting everything it came into contact with. The Traitor Titans of the Deathdealers spread the poison of their machine curse, its black plasma becoming huge oil slicks that dominated thousands of square kilometres of ocean. His ultimate fate following the fighting on Zarathusa Secundus is unknown.
Legio Appearance
Legio Colours
The colours of the Legio Mordaxis are purple and black with gold trim.
Legio Badge
The Legio badge of the Legio Mordaxis takes the from of a triumvirate of skulls; a single skull facing forward and centered upon a pair of skulls looking off to either side. This central symbol is centered within a pair of white coloured open-faced circlets; a circle within a circle, on a field of black.
Sources
- Adeptus Titanicus: The Horus Heresy - Shadow and Iron (Specialty Game), pp. 8-10, 13-14, 34-36, 70-71, 92
- The Purge (Novella) by Anthony Reynolds, pp. 44-45
Gallery
