XX Legion 'Alpha Legion': Origins & History (Wahammer 40K & Horus Heresy Lore)

the work of a historian is one that revolves around a simple maxim of evidence equating to truth through the application of diligent study and an exacting mind Verity is rendered from the swirling mass of lies untruths and superstitions certainty insofar as it can ever be truly acquired is as extracted from the mists of what was in the cases of the subjects of this account however the attempts to do just so have driven me to the cusp of Inco hate madness never have I encountered such a morass of half-truths shadowed deception occluded particulars and sheer outright lies the chroniclers work behooves one to examine all relevant sources in the composition of one's work but by the throne not ever have I found myself in such an infernal pit of shifting non evidence for every thread of investigation that yields fruit there are a dozen more that end in abject failure either proven as complete falsehoods or deliberately contradicting others that so many of these deceits are deliberate constructions is beyond doubt but even mere proof of their manufacture or from whose stylus they once flowed is impossible to determine it is as if one is chasing the coils of a formless shadowy thing an ore worm endlessly looping around and through and around and through itself possessing no beginning and having no end never has a legion been more akin to the nature of its icon that multi-headed serpent of ancient Terran myth I proceed although know that it is exact at a toll upon myself know then that this is a record of the Hera wars the multi-faced many the dreaded Hydra the 20th Legion alpha Legion while it is difficult to determine the precise origins of the Legionnaires starties by conventional means seeing as they were founded in the fires of the Terran unification Wars the 20th was quite literally a product of an atypical level of secrecy on the part of their creator the Emperor of mankind a component of his special trefoil xx were formed alongside the 6th and 18th legions in separation from the remaining 17 the exact reason for this can never be known for it was the Emperor's own clandestine intention and he does not give up his secrets easily it can be at least hypothesized given the final forms these proto legions and their pry marks were to take that they were intended to fulfill very specific purposes the three were kept veiled from their fellows operating under exacting modes of secrecy never having their deployments announced or even committed to official combat records their existence was never fully denied for the deployment of anistar t's force of arms could by the nature of their warfare never be fully concealed but this had the effect of breeding a distrust in those legions that only the eighteenth later the Salamanders would ever fully shake the sixth later the vilkin rica would see their reputation darken over time deliberately removing themselves from their fellows by a proudly maintained if deliberately affected barbarian men but in the case of the twentieth distrust was the very crux around which they would operate the first mystery of their creation went on to father more and more ambiguities and all questions raised by fellow Imperials about the Legion its nature or even its existence would go at very best answered the Great Crusade left the homeworld and reclaimed the solar volume the variously geo neza starties began to accumulate significant battle honors to their names many earning new cogno medals to replace their numerical designations or adapting to new styles of warfare that best suited the physical expressions of their gene seed and genetic enhancements of the 20th no such annals exist what we can glean can only be surmised from reports of other Imperial forces which speak suggestively of targeted strikes abductions assassinations and sabotage conducted by unidentified to start his units outside of the normal operational chain of command answering to no one and passing through campaign and war zones with impeccable clearance codes of seemingly incontrovertible origin xx presence is less confirmed and more inferred with a very lack of information around them at this point in history they are a gap in the records the missing lines in the ledger they are discernible only by the shadow cast or the hole left making them difficult to look for yes but not impossible the designate alpha appears repeatedly in these archives but with no strictly discernible point of origin or exact definition it does however seem to have dogged the wake this occluded and seemingly invisible Legion left and is possibly a holdover from the very creation process of anistar T's Legion itself during a legions creation each one since the Primus or first legion has been raised to operational active service through what are initially experimental expansion waves a starties gene seed is often fickle and without his pry marks this time lost abroad in galaxies to stabilize the process the emperor was weary of waste the gene seed was tested on various genotypes of baseline Terran humans until the most suitable group was found and upon that time implantation expanded Edwards in concentric Li larger waves featuring larger test beds of recruits the final stage of this was dubbed the Alpha induction phase the first non experimental implantation of fully stable gene seed intended to create a proto Legion of minimum fighting strength there is however no recorded evidence of the 20th Legion despite receiving its alpha induction and performing admirably in its first deployments receiving the full go-ahead for mass implantation and mass recruitment as all the other legions had done before them every single one of their 19 contemporaries underwent rapid expansion and later full-scale deployment but the 20th were effectively limited seemingly by the highest rate possible to between 1,000 and 3,000 as starties this does not appear to have been a question of gene seed suitability the implantation success rates for the 20th Legion are amongst the highest of all as starties forces possessing none of the persistent problems the dog to the sixth third or ninth legions why then was the full implantation not all doubt three theories persist amongst imperial scholarship the first being the entirely mundane lack of suitable manpower even amongst legions with higher success rates starties ascension is and was a difficult process that not all would survive the unification wars and the solar reclamation devastating to the entire volume in their own rights had bled the home system of manpower and the 20th being the last legion created by the Emperor may simply not have had any appropriate ground for recruitment as all genetic and cultural groups on Terra and within the Sol system had been hallmarked for other legions specifically those such as the fourth with superlative combat records and a proven gene seed stability fragments speak of some notable disaster occurring during this time that had undeniably proven lead ange ur and stupidity of recruiting estar t's candidates from potentially genetically tainted sources but as to its exact nature we will never know for all records concerning it have been simply destroyed the second theory posits that there was a suspicion amongst the Emperor and his gene rights as to a potential flaw or problem within the gene siege that hampered the push to full expansion for this a humble chronicler this is the least likely as the history of this period especially the dark rumors that persist amongst the fates of the 2nd and 11th Legion is replete with evidence that the Emperor was neither unable nor unwilling to ruthlessly eradicate any trace of what creations of his proved to be problematic the exigencies of the crusade would likely put paid to any concerns he had as the presence of continued issues within the 6th and 9th gene seeds proved the third and final theory is that the 20th were deliberately removed from the standard a starties process to potentially act as a strategic gene seed reserve in case of another disaster similar to that which befell the third legions gene stocks or indeed perhaps as a control group for the expansion of the Legion as a start is past the initial 20 additionally this theory can be expanded to encompass the idea that the 20th was further subjected to development and conditioning at this stage of their creation that was unique amongst the other legions [Music] whatever the exact reason we will likely never know what we can discern is that by 798 m 30 the very first expeditionary fleets left Saul and the 20th Legion effectively disappears from official history their presence however or at least the impact of is does not the Imperium in its early days was plagued with domestic rebellions petty insurrections and recidivist holdouts the great unity of the Emperor was never as total as the iterators would have liked to believe and there were plenty of defeated enemies who still harbored bitter resentments to the coming of the Lord of lightning and his armies compliance was sometimes only nominally achieved the threat of the enemy within remained even as the forces of the Great Crusade were annihilating the enemy without there is no greater example of this than the sabotage of the third legions Jean seed reserve they deliberate an almost certainly internally plotted action that nearly doomed an entire Legion of a starties to simply wither on the vine it was after this event in the fourth decade of the Great Crusade there was a market uptick in anomalous and scattered reports of a typical a start his activity far from being the masked deployments and pitched battles that typifies Legion warfare during this period these operations were almost all tactical in nature occurring far from the frontlines of the crusade and uniformly involving at most a company of ten squads that these operatives were starties is undoubtable identified as such by their sheer physical size and prowess as well as their war gear but their identity was always concealed little to no unit markings were recorded and when such idents were extant they were of a pictographic form unknown to the wider Imperium in many cases the Legionaries wore no powered armor at all infiltrating under the pretense of being AB humans or Jean bulked uterine stock where power armor was called for it was perennially uncolored these were false flag operations where these mysterious estar T's simply bore the colors and livery of another legion often one that was operating in the similar theater but without that legions knowledge or license these operations were all marked in their covert nature surgical strikes assassinations sabotage kidnapping and asset recovery all carried out on worlds already deemed compliant by the war council all seldom leaving anything in the way of witnesses to tell about them protests by the few Imperial commanders or newly installed planetary governors with the sheer pluck to speak up about covert operations carried out under their jurisdiction rebuked or simply ignored even a start his legion masters demanding to know why another legion was permitted to impersonate their own were simply told no such operations were carried out and that the ghost legion they claim to have witness did not exist despite the nominal existence of a twentieth the starties legion being a matter of military record as other specialized Imperial intelligence services were created such as the securitas in consensus the officio assassin Oram and even the fri division of the lea do custodes reports of ghost starties fell off but never disappeared entirely if all of these actions were indeed the 20th Legion which is as far as this chronicler is concerned the most likely explanation then we are presented with the terrifying prospect of a legion that operated in the Imperium shadow for well over a Terran century with seemingly no oversight whatsoever creating a vast and penetrating network of intelligence and influence that burrowed into all aspects of the Imperial macro structure if this is indeed the case then what caused the actions of the 20th in this manner to cease had their effectiveness simply been superseded by competing security bureaus at the manpower requirements of the Great Crusade necessitated the formation of another frontline Legion force or was it simply the discovery of their Primark that represented a fundamental shift in how the légion operated regardless of the cause records contained within the stacks of the logística corpus point to the first open engagement of the 20th Legion as either being a decade before the Ferren Attis extermination or appearing as unexpected reinforcements for the first legion Dark Angels during their cataclysmic participation in the third-ranked and Xena cites the case of the latter a series of fascinating logs recovered from the archives currently being investigated for material surrounding the first has rendered a curious set of factoids surrounding the 20th Legion a delegation from this unknown starties force made itself known to the fleet of the first Legion under the direct command of the Dark Angels own Primark the lion of Caliban they sought to parlay regarding the firsts ongoing extermination of the Rangda and Zino's and while a full account of these exterminations of these creatures is to be related in the future it is common knowledge that the first legion suffered terribly at their hands having their manpower previously mighty savaged utterly it is estimated that in at that time the most hard-fought campaign in Imperial military history the first legion alone lost 50,000 of starties to these wicked xenos as such the first were both according with their own nature and the trauma of the war that they had suffered deeply suspicious of the austerities force that presented itself as friend they wore the latest mark for power armor as opposed to the Dark Angels battle-worn mark - the ship appeared almost fresh out of drydock they claimed to be the 20th Legion but even the lion did not believe in their existence formed as it had been until this point out of formless rumours and half we spread suggestion perhaps most fascinatingly of all the authorities that represented the Force to the Primark of the Dark Angels did so under a pseudonym I have no doubt will shock ones acolytes given the timing the authorities called himself alf arias this is notable for even the most exact dates of the legions emergence presents a discrepancy of around 30 years satiereal but this is nothing compared to the power of uncertainty that falls upon the nature of their later reunion with their Primark [Music] all pry marks are representative of the character of their legions Alf arias is no exception for in him represented the most maddening of mysteries so typical of the Legion that derived their gene seed from him it is believed that the prime mark himself may have circulated differing versions of his origin and was aided by his own Legion in doing so one of the most popular iterations at best guests known to have originated with a naval officer present in the imperial court upon Terra placed his discovery as an accident at the hands of the 16th Legion Luna walls in it Alf arias is cast as the leader of a confederation of human worlds encountered by Horace looper Cal's 63rd expeditionary fleet forces of this alliance despite being hopelessly outgunned skillfully baited the fleet of Horus into trap after trap with ambushed after ambush bleeding the expedition as it advanced painstakingly into the enemy's volume even when the Imperials has successfully caught up with the body of the enemy fleet a lone assassin managed to board the flagship of Lupercalia the vengeful spirit slaughtering his way to Horus is very command deus it was at this point that Horus facing the assassin let out a mighty laugh recognizing that the primark was one of his own brothers the very last one to be found the account has several issues a farías has always denied it and while there are indeed several human worlds brought into compliance by Horus in the volume suggested by the story none are recorded to have shown the unified defiance told of and many of them were rendered compliant by legions other than the 16th it is likely that this account is a lie another origin torn from the minds of a 20th Legion Centurion by the effort of the custodes claims the Primark fell to a dead world in the mandragora and stars where he grew to adulthood utterly alone in the ruins of a long-dead city long years passed before a Raider party of human mutant Coursera's came upon the city looking for plunder only to find the Primark a fairy has killed them all and commandeered the ship for his very own eventually finding his way to Imperial space it is likely this account is a lie yet another contained within the prescribed and mimetic lis corrosive text known as the transit of the human soul through strife or simply the codex Hydra says that the infant Primark was found upon the thriving technocracy of bar savour only for the planet two months later fall to an invasion of the worm like Xena's flock who unable to consume the being they found kept him as a plaything to torture and experiment on only the intervention of the emperor himself saved his son from broken madness and alf aureus would spend many many years at his father's side as a master of mankind sought to undo the psychological trauma his creation had endured at the hands of his captors bizarrely this damnable text speaks of another origin stating that Alf arias or quixotic Lee a part of him remained on Terra having been spared the face that befell his scattered brothers raised in utter secrecy ah farías or the part of him it was the Emperor's greatest and most clandestine weapon held as a hidden blade only to be revealed scant moments before a desired enemies death these accounts are likely lies hidden within these diverse origin tales is likely some kernels of truth the latter especially concerning the duality of the prime marks being is of a special note given what records speak of as revelations about how various that if they shall I shall have to simply wait upon the time of another record perhaps it is possible that the reunion of the primarch with the Imperium is a mixture of elements of all perhaps his name is even unimportant as the account of the first Legion during the Rankin Xena sides far far prior to Alpha Riis's the merchants show the twentieth were invoking this name as a title or pseudonym a device to hide identity and present nothing but uniformity and unity all that can be certain is that he his legion and perhaps the Emperor himself wished none to know the truth when a twentieth primark did emerge onto the battlefields of the Great Crusade he did so seemingly out of nowhere and at the head of a now fully revealed Legion sporting their new cognate the Alpha Legion even their name is a perverse jest as despite their existence as the final numerical Astarte legion the meaning of their designates is first or beginning in its early heraldry the Alpha Legion would combine the Alpha glyph from the long-dead Hellenic script with its opposite the Omega creating the Aeternus symbol replaced with implied meanings of continuity Union and indestructibility as the years of the crusade war on the Alpha Legion elements were more commonly observed to bear the imagery of the Hydra an ancient Hellenic serpent of Terran myth fabled for growing more heads as each one is cut off just as the circumstances surrounding the discovery of its Primark are mysterious so too are the conditions of just how the Alpha Legion achieved combat strength the logística corpus was stunned to find a fully equipped Legion of tens of thousands of the starties and hundreds of starships appearing as if from nowhere despite rigorous if hushed investigations none within the corpus were able to confirm how this discrepancy had occurred what they discovered instead was perhaps more frightening that they were unable to confirm even the most basic details of the 20th Legion where their initial and current recruitment spheres were located was utterly unknown their livery was impossible to confirm and no one had even the slightest idea what its current operating strength was even its name was under doubt as alongside the Alfa Legion xx referred to themselves by over a hundred separate designates including the unbroken chain and the harrowing to name but a couple this almost psychotic dedication to occlusion was a hallmark of the Legion from the top down as even individualist artis in the field continued to refer to themselves as alpha Reyes an affectation that combined with the degrees to which the Alfa Legion Astarte 's physically resembled each other was frustrating at best and infuriating at worst to those imperial forces they served alongside xx never stated their reasons for doing this and would simply respond cryptically that individuality was of no concern that each gist artis was simply one of many whatever the reason it was but one of the many tools the legion employed to hide its true numbers and with great success such obvious attitudes towards deception were known to have been at least tolerated by the Emperor and later the war master Horace looper Cal for while the Legion was often maddening to serve alongside their effectiveness was obvious the Alpha Legion developed a reputation unmatched amongst the Legionnaires starties for the use of surveillance subversion and sabotage in its tactical preparation for the 19th Legion Raven guard was noted to possess similar skills the 20th stood in stark contrast to their brothers the sons of the Raven Lord employed such methods for the sake of efficiency and the limitation of collateral damage and civilian casualties the Alpha Legion conversely appeared to revel in the confusion and panic they sowed as more and more of their military infrastructure failed as confusion and fear spread through them the enemy would reach a sort of fever pitch of terror and it was at this Zenith the coils of the alpha Legion would fully unfurl some spoke of this final attack referred to by xx as the harrowing as being more akin to base murder than war always striking from a position of overwhelming superiority victory for the Legion was assured just as catastrophe was for the enemy no quarter no mercy no respite was given only annihilation Alf arias and his sons had a short history at least operating in the open and under their true names but their record of victories was enviable and proportional to their fellow legions and considering the time periods each operated in one of the highest conquest tallies of all the Legionnaires starties however their methods won them no friends many of their brothers saw the last prime marks methods of war making as needlessly cruel and complex the sires of the 13th Legion ultramarines and 14th Legion death card reboot Kulemin and Mort Aryan openly decried Alf arias on numerous occasions in the aftermath of Allah nor for what they saw as pointless wastes of time and imperial resources in campaigns where more direct strategies would have served just as effectively the 15th legion thousand sons attempted wherever possible to shun the 20th although no direct reason for this has ever come to light Rogal Dorne the taciturn Primark of the seventh Legion imperial fists was open about his distaste for his serpentine brother calling him an onerous assassin not fit to bear the emperor's mark the acrimony was such that the two almost came to blows after the defeat of the world Prince where dorans rebukes to off arias and his senior commanders would see the to cease contact until the terrible events of the solar war even the haunted Conrad curse Dark Lord of the eighth Legion Knight Lord's accused the Legion of hiding it's true sins behind a veil of Lies this all being said while the last Promark counted no true friends amongst his brothers there were those who could at least appreciate his efficacy the Alpha Legion successfully campaigned numerous times alongside the first Legion Dark Angels and 10th Legion Iron Hands with the prime mark of the latter Faris Manus bluntly stating that even though they were impossible to pin down the 20th completed their assigned roles with an admirable attention to detail as war master Horus looper Calvary gur to employ xx seeing them as a truly unique weapon in the arsenal of his new role increasingly to give the Alpha Legion free rein to operate independently which would in fact seem to coincide with the rapid expansion of numbers within the Legion while it is as with all things regarding xx impossible to judge their exact disposition a large numerical proliferation can be inferred from their sub appearance at the head of or representing the course of numerous post Ilyn or expeditionary fleets and rogue trader militant flotillas accounts from these fleets speak prosaically of a growing darkness within the legion soul for as ears past and the criticisms of their fellows rang louder xx appeared to take campaigns for the challenge they offered more than anything else and were off to observed to bring an enemy civilization to ash and ruin and a simple change in leadership would have effected an imperial compliance just as easily if this was due to martial pride the snubbing they received from their fellows or some darker pathological flaw inherent to the legions gene seed we shall never know we can merely decry that we did not see the Legion for what they were sooner the formless coiling thing that was ultimately impossible to trust control or track one who would sink their poisoned fangs into hundreds upon hundreds of loyal systems at the behest of their Dark Master [Music] until such a time as I may elucidate further Ave Imperator gloria in excelsis terra this video and this channel is made possible 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Channel: Oculus Imperia

Views: 138,001

Keywords: Warhammer, Warhammer 40k, Warhammer Lore, Warhammer 40k Lore, Warhammer 30k, Horus Heresy, Horus Heresy Lore, Forge World, Games Workshop, Astartes, Primarchs, Space Marines, Adeptus Astartes

Id: YRURKsd36p8

Length: 32min 6sec (1926 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 09 2020