Imperator Gradus Inexorabilis - The Emperor's March Is Inexorable
Motto of Battlegroup Arpat
To the Galactic Northeast of Terra, beyond the familiar beacon of Ultramar and the routes patrolled by its storied fleets, lies the Arpat Sector. A scattering of half-settled worlds, dust-ridden outposts, and half-forgotten colonies that had, for millennia, quietly persisted on the edge of true Imperial attention. It was only in the wake of catastrophic upheavals in the Ultima Segmentum Tyranid incursions, Chaos uprisings, and the fracturing of Imperial power that the High Lords of Terra turned their gaze toward Arpat. What they saw was not simply a frontier, but a vulnerable bulwark whose collapse could open yet another bleeding wound in a galaxy already split and hemorrhaging.
Thus was mustered Battlegroup Arpat, forged in haste but commanded by a man of deliberate, ironbound character Lord General Aleksandr Von Drakenfell. Once a Commissar of the Mordian Iron Guard, Drakenfell had clawed and carved his way up the chain of command through relentless discipline, unshakeable resolve, and a refusal to yield even a single inch of sanctioned Imperial order. His officer cadre drew heavily from Mordian and Terrax elite regiments stalwart tacticians, mechanized specialists, and highly drilled fighters accustomed to the bleakest theatres of war. Their soldiery came from worlds stretched thinly across the sector Tarentus, Masali, Moltova, Arpat itself, Zola Prime, Ra’ka, Beneril as well as an Elite Corps consisting of veteran fragments from Krieg, Armageddon, Catachan, Cobal, Mordian,Terrax and many more. A patchwork of recruitment, doctrines, and battlefield traditions that granted the battlegroup an unusual adaptability rarely seen outside the most veteran crusades.
Their mandate was simple in principle, impossible in execution: pacify the Arpat Sector, assert Imperial control, and fortify it against threats that had yet to reveal themselves. The opening act shattered any illusion that this campaign would be straightforward. Before the battlegroup had even completed its initial reconnaissance, the skies over Arpat Primaris burned with fire and falling debris. Orks drawn by ancient signals, drifting rumors of conflict, or perhaps merely by the scent of violencedescended upon the hive-world in bestial hordes. Primaris, inhabited by refugees who had fled the endless conflicts of Ultramar, found itself transformed overnight into a battleground of green-skinned savagery and desperate Imperial resistance. Drakenfell’s forces arrived just in time to witness the scale of the invasion and were forced into a brutal though decisive campaign at Daimiel, crushing the orks before they ever scathed the capital hive of Olegarius.
But the Orks were merely the first taste of Arpat’s volatility. No sooner had the Imperial forces begun to stabilize Primaris than reports from Arpat Secundus revealed a world teetering on rebellion. Nominally Imperial, Secundus had been left to fester in lawlessness for generations—a realm of prospectors, miners, rogue traders, militias, and opportunists who chafed under any attempt at central authority. Every attempt to impose order sparked fresh resistance, and the planet seemed less a world to be pacified than a hydra whose heads multiplied whenever struck.
The forge world prospect of Ra’ka, though promising, was no easier. Hazardous mountain terrain, destructive storms, and inhospitable climes made establishing even temporary Mechanicus encampments perilous. Yet Ra’ka’s mineral richness was unparalleled, and the Adeptus Mechanicus eyed it with fervent interest: a potential forge-world in the making, capable of supplying arms, armor, and vehicles to the growing number of Guardsmen flooding into the sector.
As the Imperial presence deepened, darker truths began to surface. Long after the splintering of Hive Fleet Kraken, residual Tyranid tendrils had seeded the region with Genestealer cults, lying dormant beneath the soil of fringe worlds and thriving in the agricultural paradise of Zola Prime. Beneath its emerald canopies and golden fields grew insidious networks of xenos infiltration, infecting local governance, faith structures, and labor guilds alike. Imperial attempts at control only pushed these cults deeper, where they waited for the moment to rise.
Between the worlds, the void itself became treacherous. Raptor cultists, renegade warbands, Drukhari raiders, and corrupt rogue traders turned the shipping lanes into hunting grounds. Their piracy was ruthless and coordinated, often in collaboration with xenos smugglers who spirited slaves, weapons, and warp-tainted relics between shadow ports. Many vessels simply vanished, their emergency beacons whispering last fragments of distress before going silent forever.
On the tomb world of Pavonis, seismic readings and strange energy signatures revealed an even more ominous threat: the awakening of a Necron tomb world. The stirring of its deathless legions slow, methodical, and inevitable was a dire omen. The Necrons did not yet strike openly, but they observed each Imperial landing, each troop movement, each mining operation with cold and calculating disdain.
At the sector’s borders, the Eldar of Iyanden and Alaitoc shadowed Imperial expansion. Their presence was sporadic and unpredictable. One week a colony would find its enemies mysteriously slain in the night; the next, Eldar warhosts would descend without warning, annihilating isolated outposts before vanishing like ghosts into the webway. Their intentions remained inscrutable, save for one constant: they viewed Arpat as a place where the strands of fate twisted dangerously.
And beyond them, ever seeking new footholds, the Tau Empire cast its gaze upon Arpat. These worlds embattled, underdeveloped, and poorly defended were ripe for subversion. Tau agents, auxiliaries, and diplomats seeded rebellion and unrest, promising technology, prosperity, and liberation from Imperial oppression. In the shadows, they armed separatists, trained insurgents, and whispered dreams of a new sphere of expansion one that could encircle Ultramar itself.
Then there was Rhun, the dead world lifeless, desolate, and yet somehow pulsing faintly with warp-taint. A Chaos warfleet had made its home in orbit, its motives unclear but undoubtedly malign. Cults began to bloom on nearby worlds like cancers; strange omens plagued the minds of astropaths; even the great Navigators grew wary of plotting courses through the region. Something on Rhun waited, gathered power, and watched.
In this maelstrom of shifting threats and clashing factions, even the Adeptus Astartes were drawn in. Chapters from across the galaxy heeded Guilliman’s call to reinforce Ultramar, and in their wake came others some seeking glory, some seeking atonement, others merely following the trail of war. Their presence lent hope to some worlds and terror to others, for wherever Space Marines walked, devastation followed.
Thus the Arpat Sector stands at the brink pulled in all directions by xenos predation, human treachery, Imperial ambition, and the eternal hunger of the Warp. What began as a routine stabilization effort has erupted into a full-scale, multi-front conflict with no end in sight. In the grim darkness of the far future, war is not a possibility but a certainty, and the fate of Arpat will be written not by diplomacy or decree, but by fire, by blood, and by the unending march of armies across the stars.
For In The Grim Darkness Of The Far Future, There Is Only War
