40K - THE RISE & FALL OF A FORGE WORLD | Warhammer 40,000 Lore/History

[Music] today's video is brought to you by audible audible provides a great value way to access audiobooks for its members and it's one of the best ways to make huge savings on warhammer audiobooks which is why i personally use and recommend it plus right now you can take advantage of a special offer and save a massive sixty percent on your first three months whether you're painting miniatures or doing other daily tasks throughout the holiday season audible provides a great way to optimize your 40k shortlist as an audible premium member you receive one credit every month for use on any title and the best way to get value from audible is in using your credits on those premium audio books often over 10 hours in length a great many of you in my audience are already using audible but if you're yet to try it you can start today with a free 30-day audible trial and get full access to thousands of audiobooks originals and podcasts also included in a plus catalog and it's worth repeating if you're new take advantage of saving 60 in your first three months by signing up today to learn more check my link directly below this video and go to audible.com luton or for those in the us text looting to 500 500. details on my next audiobook choice follow at the end of this video and today's selection directly complements this video so i highly recommend to stay tuned until the end and get involved with an amazing story of servature's mechanicus and the dark depths of imperial hive worlds across the dark void of our galaxy classified as the imperium of mankind there are innumerable worlds that fall under the emperor's banner in m41 but for those who have reached the indomitus era it is likely that they have only reached this point through a brutal struggle for survival if not literally through warfare against the zenos enemies of humanity the traitors and the heretics or insurrections from the populace itself then likely a world would have seen its share of factional struggles both political ideological and through contribution of resources as we have explored previously some planets during the heresy made poor gambles or their reticence in choosing sides were equally frowned upon commonly planets that did not make outright declarations of loyalty to the imperium would face later penalty and status tithe or other measures of appropriately harsh scale now the impression that is sometimes held of the lifespan for imperial planets since m30 to m41 is out of either outright loyalty to the imperium forcible subjection to it and for any others either scouring or total exterminatus and this may very well have occurred since the reality is that as i often note for a vast majority of planets the record of their history is far more gray and often strewn with glory sorrow horror and immense sacrifice while the ultimate power card of exterminatus is held by the imperium they're loathed to have to use it upon worlds which contain critical resources of any shape and form this counts doubly for planets under the control of the adeptus mechanicus for many forge worlds contain technology or the promise of information that once lost may very well never be rediscovered in the entirety of human history forgerod zhao arcad or zhao arcad and its system of the same name is situated on the border between segmentum tempestus and obscurus although a planet known for being superficially lush and green an unknown number of predatory species lurk below it is in fact classified by the imperium as a death world for despite its alluring veneer of being a verdant and beautiful planet it is in fact nightmarish for humans to exist here below the canopy little light penetrates which makes humanoid forms or to easy prey of the many vicious predators who exist here armoured insects giant snake-like creatures and far too many other forms of small but extremely unpleasant natures who will all too readily burrow below your skin for nourishment shelter or to bear their young or perhaps just all of the above in no specific order lastly even if you are prepared to deal with all of this the planet's atmosphere is in fact lethal to unaugmented humans too much oxygen concentration and humidity makes the air too difficult for standard humans to process in fact the planet itself is not conducive at all to production or habitation the environment makes materials rust and deteriorate more rapidly and production of consumables is also prohibitively inefficient in fact zhao arcade produces much of its consumable products off world on its satellites where the majority of the system's population reside these are then transported to the forge world where the small complement of staff necessary to make the forge world productive and feasible zhao arcad uses its three satellite moons to achieve this as well as the volcanic system world of naitos nitos is primarily home to mining colonies due to its abundance of heavy metals and other critical substances from manufacturing on forge worlds but the obvious question remains why in hell would anybody choose to found a forge world on such an inhospitable and under-resourced planet and the answer of course is they wouldn't during the dark age of technology it's important to remember that the cult of the machine as far as we understand it did not exist nor the mechanicus or mechanicum the mechanic originated during the end of the dark age of technology and during the early period known as the age of strife this is when the galaxy was wrought with warp storms as the eldar devolved into their most disturbing end times and this was only eventually ended by the birth of the chaos god slaanesh mars and terror earth before the imperium and mechanicum were two worlds within one galactic empire they had eventually developed as separate worlds both populated by humanity and unlike mars of the imperium during the dark age of technology mars was believed to have been terraformed due to the technology of the time and appeared more like old earth ocean's lush green plant life however during the collapse of humanity's golden age and the early period of the age of strife mars would at some point fall into a state of collapse in this time of total disorder and chaos the planet tore itself apart as did many worlds across the galaxy including terror itself and it's important to remember two things the religion of the tech priests the cult mechanicus only appeared in this period after mars had fallen into ruin and secondly that this is when we saw the rise of what would be known as the mechanicum there was no faction known as the mechanicus until the horus heresy when the mechanicum was divided and thus it became the loyalist adeptus mechanicus and the traitor dark mechanicum however the important fact is that the religion of the tech priests of mars and all their followers remains as always the cult mechanicus they worship the machine god these are just simply technical details but they are one of the most commonly mistaken aspects of 40k and so i always feel compelled to highlight these details at every opportunity because it's so simple but so regularly mixed up mechanicum pre-heresy adeptus mechanicus post heresy cult mechanicus religion however it is also specifically relevant to the story here because the founding of zhao arkad is speculated as having occurred around the end period of the dark age of technology and there's no alternative period as being noted for this event so i wanted to be clear it's my personal speculation that this is in fact not correct it doesn't make sense simply for the fact that the forge world of zhao arcade was founded as a forge world of the cult mechanicus and so if our ancient dates are to be adhered to it makes no logical sense for it to have been founded prior to this in fact although mars sent out colony ships in collaboration with terror prior to the age of strife this would also be prior to the origin of the mechanicum tech priests because although mars was apparently sending ships out into the galaxy right up until the end of the dark asia technology the cult mechanicus didn't exist until into the age of strife so it cannot possibly have originated prior to that the small fleets of arc mechanicus carrying tech priests of the cult mechanicus were only sent out during gaps in the ferocity of warp storms during the age of strife and additionally the question of how and why anyone would choose to settle on a death world such as azal arched is specifically relevant as it suggested that the reason as to why the ship and its colonists from mars even ended up there was specifically because of warp storms which threw them powerfully of course and the only system they were able to locate is habitable they designated the zao planetary system now locating a system capable of supporting their colonization efforts was only one part of the problem upon landing the martian colonists came to realize their new world was extremely inhospitable in about every way possible so they instead turned to their ship this was in fact fairly common for colonization both before the end of the age of technology and any colonization which occurred thereafter where colonists and their stc would quickly cannibalize or otherwise use their ship to forge new cities or for survival upon a world before ships were capable of warp travel they had actual little leaves for a ship once arriving at their new home and even after their primary goal was to colonize planets ships could always be constructed again later immediate survival was the priority on planets that were often in an extremely raw state it's in fact been discovered and suspected that many ancient hive worlds and their under hives are in fact the remains of ancient starfaring vessels some perhaps even from the dark age of technology this is why mechanicus expeditions often seek technology in buried ruins and take exploratory missions into the darkest recesses of an underhive so it's entirely possible that somewhere on a world in the imperium hidden well below the surface exist vaults or archives of ancient lost technology perhaps even a semi or fully functional stc including its ai so for now the colonists of zhao arkad and their fate was not all that unusual they had to make decisions based on the situation at hand and this meant sealing themselves within their ship to ensure they were protected from the hellish environment outside gladly for the colonists mechanicum colony vessels carried a complement of titans and these enabled the early survival of the ship and the subsequent informal name of their legio as the iron vigil these were the titans of legiostoviaks it had quickly become apparent that survival on the surface was going to become a near impossibility and it said that the titans of the iron vigil were nearly permanently occupied in its earliest time with eliminating threats and where any outside clearance of forest was attempted the growth speeds of flora were so aggressive as to make development challenging at best impossible at worst the surface of the world was effectively in a near constant state of warfare between plant life that choked offensively invaded hunted and ruthlessly devoured any who threatened their territory and then a seemingly endless spectrum of animal life who did the same the natural organic life on the surface of the planet was a brutal merciless war of attrition that never ended and a battle the colonists could not afford to engage while maintaining efficient use of resources and so despite the difficulty involved excavating tunnels below the surface was the only feasible option to the mechanicum colonists with the arc mechanica ship acting as a cover and essentially an airlock to the surface it enabled them to dig down whilst cannibalizing the ship itself to create machinery and devices necessary for their survival that they might later establish the first forge faint and gain a foothold upon the world the success then enabled others to steadily expand with their own subterranean fans and the planet steadily became a functional colony every expansion gaining them further efficiency and technological capabilities every year broad expansion and stability and within the first century of colonization their supreme dominar declared this their first conjunction a period which was designated as being that within which the colony would continue development until it was deemed fully equipped and a functioning forge world they also would expand to mining bases on their orbiting moons and other system areas with critical resources such as nitos this millennia-spanning first conjunction would see further colonizations on the moons themselves designated arcade 1 2 and 3 and permanent mining bases were established on each moon and simple spacecraft constructed from the colony ship to reach these relatively nearby orbiting bodies and convey materials between them this was very common for colonizing vessels as was colonization within a system which would similarly take place here after the moons were set up and became productive this was the period it was determined more efficient that the labor force of the primary world of zhao archive remain on its orbiting moons to provide resources and supplies for the key workers of the tech priests forge veins and their supreme dominar below the surface of the death world so despite their difficult beginnings all seemed orderly it was productive and despite their poor luck on landing on such a hostile cursed world mechanical leadership concluded that they were now fully operational and the first conjunction period was now successfully completed despite the lunar mining colonies being well established and continually ferrying resources back and forth to the subterranean fans of zara arched the pure resources of the moons alone would not be anywhere near sufficient to provide what would be required to continue expansion and fuel the development of the planet into a powerful forge world much more was required for the tech priests to fulfill their planned ambitions critically while the resources provided by the orbiting moons have been enough for the first conjunction these were now inadequate to enable the second which was of course to begin developing the means to produce more advanced technologies specifically those which would enable the colony to begin exploration and claim territory beyond their own system in order to do this they required a broader array of minerals and materials and so they would begin a colony fleet to set out for the neighboring system world designated as nitos nitos had already been assessed with survey probes as containing rare elements of thankfully the minerals and properties required by the forge fans for their expansion of higher tier tech in the past thousand years the colonies of the moons had grown exponentially and so it was suitable also that they began expanding further to that end they launched their first expedition to naitos but their gamble in reaching the world would be the first step that marked a downward spiral that would steadily pull the forge fans into a state of disruption to reach their primary goals were already looking like an immense challenge just reaching naitos was barely within their capability the lack of resources to craft a ship capable of the journey was acute and having already consumed much of the original arc ship and specifically materials needed for void travel it was uncertain how sizable an exploratory mission could be sent to the new world necessary for further expansion [Music] their only option to reach naitos would be to combine materials of the transport fleet used for conveyance between the moons and zhao arcade and link multiple engines together to provide the explorative vessel the necessary power to escape the gravity wall of the planet and make the estimated six months journey to naitos carrying a colonization force numbering roughly 20 000 workers and many forged domini from the prime forge fame while it was roughly half white in nantus this ship was hit by a tiny meteorite tearing the ship's hull and causing explosive decompression that triggered a chain reaction within the entire colonization force were killed by the vacuum of the void and the impact of this catastrophic failure would have far-reaching implications the server workers of the moon colonies vastly outnumbered the tech priests who roared and at this point in time the isolated world of tsar arkad did not have the large capabilities of population suppression that are held by the modern imperium and so the domini were significantly concerned that the population who were deeply committed to the faith of the cult mechanicus would see this mission failure as a terrible sign potentially the omniscient had judged them or their leadership and had turned away and so the tech priest leadership would begin to focus their attentions on mining a nearby reachable asteroid field far less rich in resources than naitos but accessible and sustainable for the interim unfortunately during this time the warp would once again become ever more powerfully unstable and this began to cause strange occurrences on the humans within this system just as it was throughout the galaxy during the age of strife essentially it was becoming far more disruptive and encroaching onto real space and so this is when we begin to see psyches emerging more openly in humanity and unfortunately with them the hellish beings of the warp not necessarily demons at this time but still things taking possession or using psyches as portals to breach real space including potentially the beings which are rumored in ancient legend to have brought the downfall of the old ones these are known as enslavers strangely during the age of strife it was in fact the civilizations on worlds who had embraced the emergence of psyches that is to say the more open-minded worlds who in fact fared better as they had enabled early cycas to learn to control themselves better and so were far less likely to become consumed or let themselves be used as a puppet of the nightmarish beings of the warp whereas planets which had either shunned and pushed emergent cycles underground suffered greatly as they became portals for dark entities out of sight and more importantly out of control zao arcade wouldn't be spared this phenomena and the disturbances of the immaterium turned previously beautiful and passive auras into haunting oppressive ethereal spaces the deepest areas of the fans saw possessions or spontaneous insanity among citizenry especially those who were suspected of emergent psychic power this entire sequence during the age of strife was another reason for the fall of humanity and why by the period of m30 so much of human civilization had been utterly destroyed or turned to backward states of chaotic marauding warlords where previously civilized worlds had once been for planets who had somehow come through the war with the men of iron and the collapse of the golden age the dark age and then been independent enough to remain stable during the warp storms of the age of strife which isolated systems across the entire galaxy the sudden powerful emergence of psyches and their instability was often enough to break the keystones of many a world who had appeared strong enough to weather the galactic tempest for zhao arcade the levels of disturbance were not critically severe but they were bad enough that the dominar turned their focus toward defence and control of their work at class this tightening control combined with extra demands on four trains due to the failure of the initial naitos expedition caused considerable discontent and questioning of the leadership among the worker class others would lean in on their religious outlooks and consider the possibility that the omnisia had in fact turned away from the supreme domini things were looking ever bleaker and zao arcade was entering into a downward spiral of doubt and disorder and to remind again while even in these early times control of populations could be very strict but this is still not the imperium isolated worlds during the era of the age of strife were far more susceptible to population revolt because they had no means of reinforcement externally and if an entire population decided to overthrow its leadership there's a very good chance this could happen a good case in point might be rafanon had the world of rafalen decided to rebel in this era it's likely it would have been far more successful because it wouldn't have been able to have the reinforcement but regardless that would only last so long until eventually the imperium inevitably showed up so for early colonies like zhao arcad though the threat of rebellion and collapse was very real and the tightening of control by the leadership only created further resentment and strain between themselves and the worker class of the forge fans and these satellite mining colonies [Music] forge fans across zou arched were continuing now to arm themselves for defensive purposes in line with the commands of the supreme dominai which on reflection was a questionable decision because many were now using not just approved templates to construct from but also discovered weaponry of xenos attackers who had passed through or died upon the world previously more commonly of those who descended upon the less well-defended worker colonies upon the moons of zao arcad in the modern imperium such bastardized weaponry would be considered tech heresy but for many worlds in these early times and especially those who were out on the peripheral rim these were more prone to severe or even fully breaking the established rules of say the cult mechanicus because with no higher authority to answer to there were always those who would push the boundaries and again this is another common question which comes up why don't we see more experimentation just among the populous or among other smaller members of the cult mechanicus and the answer to that question actually relates to my choice of audiobook for today because it comes down to the fact that the cult mechanicus actually has its own essentially internal policing force which investigate and locate constantly people who are doing just this to shut them down not to mention of course inquisitors the arbitees and so on and so on and so on but on the zhao arcade at this time the use of xenos tech was not the end of it the supreme dominar would also allow for experimentation with these nudie emergent psyches and they began to study the generation and replication of these abilities the tech priests were even partly successful in this by augmenting cortexes of automata with synthetic mapped neural nets and harvested cortex material from workers those with these seemingly enhanced cortexes granted some the ability of vastly increased responses to stimuli some even demonstrating near pre-cognitive abilities to respond to threats now all of these experiments were strictly outlawed by the mechanicum and the cult mechanicus but these kind of deviations were not unusual at all for forge worlds that were established and isolated during the age of strife on zhao arcad however all of this was doing nothing to prevent the steadily downward slide of civilized order perceived favor between fans and colonies tensions in leadership and now ever more common xenos assaults and those internal warping cursions things were beginning to unravel the latter centuries of m27 would be the point at which things boiled over and previous loyalties between some of those favored forge fans would finally snap coupled with the completion of hybrid automata and prototype black iron hybrid cores that were to be tested in the titans of legiostobiacs by those fans who had been tolerated in their heritage experimentation these achievements would gain significant political favor with the supreme domini but for the considerable number of smaller forge veins especially those who are strictly abstaining from the study of the forbidden technology there was a boiling rage beneath the surface at the blatant disregard that was being demonstrated for the purity of the teachings of the cold mechanicus this was to become a true fracture point as a split opened between those feins who considered that in order to survive at all they must follow the strict ideology of the cult and the omniscient as opposed to those who saw opportunity in the zenos tech and bizarre psychoabilities those who did so were being ever more vocally condemned and seen as damaging to the purity of those who strictly adhered to the cult so when a forged domini of the chiari forge vein suffered severe rad poisoning from a contaminated nutrient shot which was believed to have originated from a purist cult forge vein things ceased to be a situation there were merely ever more polarized ideological differences things quickly turned from being a vicious war of words to a physical conflict between rival fans still the planet itself helped to make conflicts not as open or all-consuming as they might otherwise have been and so this helped to limit the battles to be more random and a slow burning of more like sabotage lightning raids assassination attempts and general infiltration to sow disorder and disruption between rival fames primarily between those who had sparked things off the eminari and the chiari forge fans kyary having been put at a stern disadvantage by the assassination of its leader at the start of the conflicts the supreme dominar decided that choosing sides was not a wise course of action and instead would withdraw to isolation upon an orbit or fortress the focus in their opinion was upon vital planetary infrastructural sites and maintaining their security against any aggression while simultaneously condemning all violence with repeated cause for a ceasefire and while some might see the dominar's decision here as being cowardly or simply sitting on the fence not wanting to get involved the option was reasonable given their circumstances going all in with either of the sides be it the more radical or the more puritan would risk an all-consuming war that would lead to either one's destruction or deal such collective damage to the colony which was already struggling to secure resources that none would survive in the long term except that it was this lack of resources that the dominar had calculated would in fact cause the fires of conflict below to eventually burn themselves out xenos harassing attacks the bizarre corruptions of psyches combined with the already limited resources available finally prevented the fans from engaging in what could well have been an endless war of attrition and so it was that after nearly three decades the conflict between feigns came to a close by a situational arbitration despite the conflict having come to a conclusion of sorts though the situation was grave eighty percent of the total feigns had suffered some level of damage impacting their general operation damage broadly referring to either infrastructure or their labor force and around half of that number were only now at a minimal operational level the remaining insignificant 20 were now not operational at all so all of the major fans had lost in the conflict and the entire situation had been extremely damaging and unconstructive however unsurprisingly neither faction could still come to any reasonable forward agreement about how to deal with the other the purist faints still wanted to see the heretics punished for their heresy and were in their eyes the cause of the problems from the outset while those of the opposing view sought only an armistice essentially both sides still held their original perspectives fighting had merely become inviable at this point the supreme dominar at that time decided not to favor with either view she instead opted for a bizarre non-decision of essentially separating the fighting factions they would be isolated and should no longer communicate or interact with one another instead each side's developmental research would remain their own from here on and any subterranean tunnels between them collapsed or sealed it was a warring aftermath conclusion equivalent to that of just separating fighting siblings patrols between any necessary remaining connecting infrastructure would be operated by the supreme dominance forces and if this seems as if they opted for that solution that was basically just kicking the can down the road as it were that's exactly what it was but the dominar's rationalization here was that any inevitable problems down the line would just be addressed as and when they arose so hardly a groundbreaking piece of diplomacy and one which held considerably worrying implications for future issues like say the arrival of the imperium considering the miserable state of affairs within the zao system one might have expected there to be a horrifying end when the imperium finally entered the fray during its explorations of the great crusade luckily for the forge world their initial contact was not with a fleet of mechanicum who may well have declared the colony tech heritage point blank and ordered their destruction a fleet of mining vessels detected signals being sent out in ancient terran promising peace and with accompanying ident codes these were relayed to the forge world where the supreme dominar instructed them to visually identify the incoming vessels it was immediately clear these were no zenos it was in fact the exploratory vessels of the 15th legion when they made planet zhao arkad the thousands sons would be met by the supreme domini and her tacitus proctor thankful for their reintegration with the wider human empire the dominar was glad to be brought into the new imperium and more importantly restore communications with mars also despite their best efforts at this time zhao arched had still only achieved minimal success as a colonization their primary homeworld itself had been badly damaged and remained in a state of tension naitos had finally been successfully colonized but by refugees who escaped the main world during the conflict and then satellite moon mining operations for a forge world it was not much to speak of and made worse by their self-inflicted damage and the less said about their wild deviations from martian doctrine the better for all for xanarcat itself things were set now to considerably improve any zeno's threats would be destroyed and driven off further by imperials now defending the furthest frontier of their empire and like many new worlds the imperium required tithe workers in regiments and some of the titan legio and these were begrudgingly loned for the further expansion of the imperium in the great crusade but what though of the questionable technological developments made by those more let's say open-minded forge veins and this is where zhao arcade survived through good fortune their discovery by the thousand suns likely spared them from the severe purging that might otherwise have taken place specifically because the thousand suns had a clear interest in discovering more about their psycho technology developed by the forge frames on zara arcade and particularly their psychic imprint hybrid automata definitely outlawed by the mechanicum but of significant interest for the sons of prospero the thousand sons sought to solidify their relationship with the zao archived forge world in perhaps a far closer way than may have been ordinary the tacitus proctor will be taken to prospero itself so as to enable his further research and additionally a garrison of thousand suns marines would be stationed on zhao arkhad this was favorable to the supreme dominar of zhao herself for several reasons firstly the re-situation of the forged dominar to prosperoy would defuse the continual tension which had existed on zara arcade since their internal conflict plus it would bolster the new relationship with the imperium and the 15th legion so it was a win-win and these matters would be settled in very short order it also though would ensure zhao arcade's position as a system of traitors to the imperium albeit unbeknownst to themselves of course during the scouring of prospero it's believed that over 30 million lives were lost in the prosecution of the empire's justice the majority of those being imperial citizens some escaped off world or have been transported elsewhere previously with bands of astartes but to all intents and purposes the prospering branch of mankind had been extinguished for the thousand suns themselves their losses on prospero were near total and were left with objectively a few scattered survivors across the galaxy still enough remained that they would aid horus in the siege of terror but in terms of a legion they were significantly diminished some detachments of thousand suns after the scouring of prospero who had survived across the galaxy would be subsequently exterminated by loyalist legions in this time however there are known to have been several thousand of the sixth fellowship present on zou arched as part of the agreement between the legion and the forge world yet the situation was just as grim and precarious as their stranded or slaughtered brothers for with no means to resupply or recruit barring open piracy they were entirely cut off quite obviously though the sub feigns sent to prospero by the supreme dominar have been also completely destroyed along with its defending titans from zhao arcade although they had put up a surprisingly strong fight and were only finally able to be destroyed by the strange titans of the ordo sinister for titans from the legio of mortis this strange small contingent of titans from an isolated backwater forge world faring so well against an onslaught of their own titans was deeply concerning and so the mechanicum of the time deemed it necessary to send an investigation fleet to zao arkad it never arrived the reasons have never been discovered but it seems that the zao system was dealt another good hand in the game of fate and so avoided what would have been undoubtedly a painfully merciless investigation by the delegation from mars instead zhao arcade somehow continued to remain relatively isolated and so this is where the forge world situation became quite strange and interesting after hearing of this situation on prospero the outraged supreme domini who had previously been reticent to declare definitive positions immediately declared zhao arkad as seceding from the imperium we might speculate as to how strong the influence of several thousand members of the 15th legion still stationed at zhou arcade at this time may have been however they were soon also to depart they had more important missions of their own now like connecting with the primark and seeking vengeance for prospero but not before of course taking an entourage of magos and thralls from the more heretic fans thus leaving the supreme domini at the mercy of some fairly incensed and far more aggressive puritan forge fans who were considerably more proactive than those fans who had acted out of obligation more than zealous outrage the supreme dominar had not calculated just how outraged the puritan side of the forge veins were having already been considerably displeased at the original allowance of what they considered her attack faints to experiment with such forbidden technology and then after being reconnected with mars only to then have the domini cut them off because of some conflict in the wider imperium was far too offensive for them to bear so the supreme dominar was violently deposed and suffered death at the hands of the puritan famed domini this created a new problem zhao arkad was far enough away from the core of the imperium that it had no real bearing on the heresy taking place nor was it in any position to be affected or involved in any major battles the mars investigatory fleet never arrived and the thousand suns had departed so what would happen now without the previous neutrality of the commanding supreme domini the opposing fans slipped back into their previously aggressive stances each arguing they should hold control over the forge world the situation unsurprisingly was not resolved and so they remained in a violent standoff over what should happen next eventually as a result of the impasse each would declare independence from the other not dissimilar than what had occurred already but this presented another problem what exactly did independence mean well initially it meant more conflict they would begin seizing control of ships and their navigators to enable them to operate beyond borders and became quasi-mercenary offering their services for reward to this end some would end up allied even with traitor marines like the death guard and for those who remained they held out hope of the sense of civilized order promised by the imperium or simply sought out a more pure existence within the tenets outlined by the cult mechanicus this did not mean that zhao arkhad just returned to a calm and peaceful state the puritan fames continued with internal investigations and purges of heretic fans and their worker class this was done out of their own ideological views as much as it was out of a fear for their practices to have become widely known and threatened the forge world itself to some degree the planet of zhao arcade would bizarrely become a world which was able to exist as both heretic and loyalist simultaneously but would not return to the imperium proper until the age of scouring post-heresy [Music] zao arcad is an interesting study in the tides of imperial favor toward a world colonized by humanity plus it has the oddity of the mechanicus tech heresy mixed in with it we see how across many thousands of years humans have struggled to settle colonize and expand territory of planets and systems across the galaxy no matter how difficult the conditions worlds like zao arcad exist as a curious demonstration of the shifting decisions necessary to ensure survival to reach a point at which the great crusade would take place one might consider from a detached objective view how their decisions made for a world under such pressures are both reasonable and understandable yet in the eyes of arriving fleets during the crusade worlds like south arcade could very easily run the risk of being totally purged if their outlook was not in line with that of the imperial truth or in this case the doctrine of the cold mechanicus for zao arkad their glory had shone barely momentarily and only in part because of their heretic exploration of psyches fused with ancient technology it is ironic that their adapted titan legio strengths would be considered tech heresy yet then ultimately crushed by the emperor's side titans which were fully authorized these are archives and discoveries were subsequently contained and scoured from record upon their world if you want to believe that unless they incur the wrath of the mechanicus post heresy in a period of such blind rage as the scouring any of those who pushed the boundaries of what were permissible would most certainly be viewed as heretics and subjected to very likely planetary levels of extermination while zhao arcade would never become a forge world with the prestige of riza for its location far too distant and its resources too minimal to be of any significant use these are not the only ways by which a name can be known within the imperium although thou arched found itself out of favor post-heresy and became a relatively isolated and unimportant forge world the tech priests were able to discover some lost stc data from presumably their original arc ship which had brought them to the planet so many millennia previously the discovery of any stc templates are a major accolade and gain significant reputational elevation within the mechanicus what they unearthed upon as our arched was an stc applicable for indeed two separate vehicle types a major discovery they found templates for a super heavy imperial transport the crassus armored assault transport and the same body modified from missile system the prey tour armoured assault launcher the transport is a gigantic super heavy vehicle and was given its name by one of solar mercurius generals borgen crassus this crassus super heavy vehicle chassis was believed to have been discovered later than the actual weapon template itself and thus it was only after its discovery that the praetor launcher was able to then be developed like most super heavy advanced systems it requires a higher manufacturing cost than other simpler imperial systems but its durability and versatility of purpose quickly enabled it to become widely adopted by imperial guard forces throughout segmentum tempestus and now even beyond this region however these stc patterns originated from zao arcad and for all of its redemption since the heresy it was unable to shake off the rumors of tech heresy which meant that all the glory that should have been coming from discovering two stc patterns was not so forthcoming indeed if anything it's said to have led to suspicion about if such reclaimed tech should be used at all and this is perhaps why in the time since zao arkad appears to have been making a concerted effort to hunt down and eradicate all potential instances of tech heresy and in the indomitus era it is said to have regained a significant level a respectable reputation for being visually anti-heretic and if anything is now seen there's a forge world that will actively hunt and punish her attacks with zero clemency now as i often say in the age of the imperium things are rarely clear or set in stone but what appears to be the case is that in the time since the scaring post heresy those puritans of zao arcade have continued to explore and expand in segmentum tempestus and establish enclaves of cult mechanicus across various imperial planets notably hive worlds where some of these enclaves number in the many millions of followers which sounds like a lot but when you consider that many hive worlds have tens of billions of citizens this is really in the small percentages upon the hive world of alecto home to the hive city of varanganchua a hive city so vast it even has its own climate zones interestingly somewhat comparably to zhao arcad alecto as a world is so distant from most standard imperial activity its common citizenry do not even believe that what are referred to as xenos even exist which seems almost unbelievable and like setting yourself up for disaster down the line but this curiosity helps us consider it's worth remembering for all the horror and bizarrity in the galaxy there exist imperial worlds who have never seen anything other than low-level mechanicus and augmented humans certainly know astartes or xenos the planet of alecto and its hive cities being one example and it gives you a true sense of the scale of the galaxy that yes there are these concentrated areas which are in a state of constant warfare but there are many imperial worlds which exist in relative levels of peace albeit still heavily subjugated and suppressed by the imperium electo is one example of a planet where these new enclaves of mechanicus have found their home and the largest of these belongs to that of zhao arcad here it operates not only industry but also religious aspects of the mechanicus and within that deploys its operatives some of whom are part of the cologiat extremists these individuals seek out any and all heretics they're essentially the arbitees of the mechanicus as i was speaking to you earlier and it's their role to investigate apparent instances of any and all involved in dark or suspect matters of tech heresy or other crimes that might infringe the so-called law mechanicus that's the legal code of the adeptus mechanicus it remains a point of contention as to whether zhao arcade has truly cleansed its heretic activities its vaults caverns and tunnel networks that run deep below the surface of its death world many links and networks deep underground were sealed when the two factions of puritan and heratek were separated by their first supreme domini is it all a visual ploy or have they truly moved on just like those lost stc it's really anybody's guess as to whether or not there may still exist some of those who operate and push the boundaries as to what's acceptable within the cult and law mechanicus it's been seen on other worlds machines to house the dark beings from the warp constructed in near enough plain sight on forge worlds so who knows what could still be lying in the dark nasty regions of zao arcad where nobody goes deep within such a dank and uninviting place there could be vile creatures serving their masters but likely this is nothing compared to what may lie below ancient trapped doors from the horror of m41 there's always something down there in the dark waiting to come out as the imperium entered the endometus era far too many of its factions continued to wallow in the lost glory of the heresy era it's been some 10 000 years but there still remain threats not only from those who would seek to overwhelm with sheer weight of force but those like the tao who are very quickly expanding their technology at a rate which threatens to outpace the imperium there are multiple storms on the horizon for humanity in m41 a technological age of apostasy being one of them while bizarrely the rest of humanity continues to immerse itself in the imperial cult humanity cannot continue to wallow in stagnation or it threatens to suffocate itself into oblivion there are those like belisarius call who see the way forward and it begs the question will such tech heresy be tolerated and merged with existing cult doctrine or will it look to cause the kind of zealous fracturing seen on zao arcad but this time on a galactic scale [Applause] [Music] [Music] so let's briefly talk about my next selection for audible firstly i want to continue to remind my end of year recommendation is still the dark imperium trilogy a great audiobook series no matter your level of 40k knowledge plus it's valuable in understanding where things stand for humanity in the indomitus era i'll be looking at it further in the first quarter of 2022. today's recommendo is part of the relatively new 40k crime series the crime series deal often with the more civilian side of the 40k verse and it means we're allowed a rare glimpse into the dark underbelly of imperial life something so many are always asking to know more about i've so far enjoyed everything in the crime series but directly related to this video today i would recommend you listen to flesh and steel by guy haley who was coincidentally the author of the dark imperium trilogy flesh and steel couldn't be more different we follow probator's simeon noctis into the dark hell of servature production he must team up with a tech priest and together uncover some of the most bleak examples of the reality for citizens living in the imperium of m41 as i noted at the beginning this audiobook overlaps with the background of zhao arcad and so it's an excellent follow-up for today's video and a very intriguing insight to the reality of those who live within the mechanicus the characters setting and story are suitably dark and these are exactly the kind of narratives i enjoy listening to for taking a break away from heavy ongoing series like the heresy and to also flesh out the experience of life at the human level of the imperium the crime series has truly been a breath of fresh air and once you're down with this i'd gladly recommend any of the others which sit within that series long may it continue lastly remember if you're new to all of this you can get involved today plus the bonus of for a limited time saving sixty percent on your first three months of audible full access to the plus catalog filled with thousands of audiobooks originals and much more try it today by using my link directly below this video or just go to audible.com luton or for those in the us text looting to 500 500. as always i'll finish by saying a huge thanks to all of you supporting me here on the channel this year and i'll see you all in the next one [Music] you

Channel: Luetin09

Views: 186,869

Keywords: Gaming, Discuss, Channel, Future, 40K, Warhammer 40K, Imperium, Humanity, Mankind, Doom, Fall, Space Marines, Heretic, Heresy, The Emperor of Man, Lore, History, Guide, Warhammer 40000, Warp, Immaterium, Rift, War, Slaughter, Horror, Nightmare, Tabletop, Inquisition, Mechanicus, Tech Priests, Mechanicum

Id: T-piiMmpHN8

Length: 49min 29sec (2969 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 17 2021