Grey Knight, Warhammer 40,000 meets the Elder scrolls Options

[Colonel Mustard]

This is an idea I had a while ago, and had been entertaining for a while. As you may have guessed by the subtitle, this is an Elder Scrolls/40K crossover. For those you don’t know the rich lore of 40K, here’s a rough image of it.

It is the 41st millennium, and war has raged for eternity. The mighty empire of humanity, the Imperium of Man, rules the galaxy, home to a million worlds and untold trillions of people. Guided by its divine Emperor, interred on the golden throne after being wounded by his most favour son, the Imperium is a force that seems unstoppable. Yet mankind’s great empire is beset on all side by aliens, traitors and, most fearful of all, the daemons of the warp. These creatures, existing in a realm not dissimilar to Oblivion, are the most deadly threat to all living things. Existing in the warp are the four Gods of Chaos, Khorne, blood of skulls, death and battle, Slaanesh, God of Debauchery, Nurgle, god of decay and disease and Tzeentch, the god of plots and cunning, the weaver of fates and destinies, playing the great game of existence with the skill of a grand master. Whether they are united or they are divided, the four gods of chaos plot, scheme and plan to destroy the material world and make it one with the warp, damning all living things to a nightmarish existence of eternal torment.

And to fight these foes are the mightiest of warriors. The Space Marines, the Adeptus Astartes, the greatest warriors ever to stride upon a battlefield. Made by the divine Emperor of Mankind, each Space Marine is genetically engineered to be stronger, faster and far longer lived by any ordinary man, and psycho-indoctrinated to know no fear. Wielding the most powerful weapons and armours humanity has available; the Space Marines form an impenetrable bulwark against the foes of man. And greatest among them are the Grey Knights, Humanity’s last line of defence against the denizens of the Warp. The military branch of the Emperor’s Holy Inquisition; the Grey Knights are clad in blessed adamantium and wield the fabled Nemesis force weapons. Each one of these holy warriors is able to fight and defeat an army single handed. And now, a company of these blessed warriors has been sent to combat the dread army of Askillarrat the Insane, a greater daemon of Tzeentch, and amongst them is the fabled Brother Captain Alicarius.

Grey Knight-Book One of the Liber Oblivionicus

Part 1-Daemons

Purple flames clawed the sky like the talons of some bizarre, reality defying monster. Buildings were consumed by its twisting blaze, it intense heat melting the rockcrete and steel that made them up, slumping them down into a thick syrupy liquid.

And in the flames, creatures charged forward. Twisting and dancing impossibly, Daemonettes, the alluring yet repellent servants of Slaanesh, made their way through the flames, giggling and singing sweetly. Next to them shambled the Plaguebearers. Corrupted hulks, with a single eye and a horn sprouting form their foreheads, they dripped with disease, buboes spilling pus and gashes in their stomach spilling thick, rubbery intestines. They carried huge, rusted blades, thick with rotten blood and the entrails of their foes, whilst flies buzzed about them, occasionally stopping on their host to feast on a small part of rotten flesh.

Next to them sprinted Bloodletters, murderous servants of Khorne. Their skin, coloured blood red, split and bled constantly, an unending tribute to their monstrous patron. They hefted great broadswords, roaring and screaming in their hatred.

And most bizarre of all were the daemons of Tzeentch.

To behold a creature of such madness and lack of logic was enough to drive most men insane. The cavorting and twisting monstrosities giggled with insane laughter as they advanced, flames crackling around them. Faces formed on their bodies, in any place they could, sometime even being held between their outstretched hands.

And against this horde of unholy death stood fifty of the Imperium’s finest warriors. Nemesis force weapons were activated, electricity crackling around the blessed halberds and claymores. Storm bolters, mounted on the wrists of suits of adamantium armour, were cocked and loaded. The Grey Knights were the only force that stood between the Daemons and the utter annihilation of the planet.

Brother-Captain Alicarius muttered the prayer of vengeance as he slammed the specially made magazine of bullets into his weapon. Around him, warriors murmured prayers to the God-Emperor as they prepared for battle, checking weaponry systems and getting into battle formation. Behind, he heard Brother Deacus attach a tank of prometheus into his incinerator, the highly volatile fuel having been blessed and mixed with holy oils to cause the most damage possible to their daemonic foes.

The warriors took up their battle positions, and allowed the auto-senses in their helms to pick their targets and display their range.

The Daemons thundered onwards, approaching faster than ever.

“Pick Targets!” shouteded Alicarius. “On my order…fire!”

Bolter shells ripped from the Grey Knight lines, the bullets detonating inside their targets, causing the daemons to be blasted apart.

Yet they continued.

The Daemons came within Incinerator range, and burning blue fuel was jettisoned onto the creatures, burning many of them to cinders. Their screams echoed across the battlefield.

Then the creatures were upon the Grey Knight lines.

Alicarius swung his halberd in an arc, slicing through a bloodletter, before spinning and planting it in the bloated, rotten belly of plaguebearer. He yanked his weapon upwards, sending an arc of rotten gore flying into the air, before it splattered onto his armour. It hissed as it contacted the blessed adamantium, the ichors reacting violently with the holy oils and unguents upon the armour.

Alicarius span and slashed with his brothers, slicing through the daemons, bellowing litanies and prayers and sending off bursts of bolter fire at point blank range into any Daemon foolish enough to get close enough.

Suddenly, he was slammed to the ground by something that looked like a mechanical rhinoceros made of reddened brass, ridden by a Bloodletter. A Bloodcrusher of Khorne-a dread knight of the Blood God. The rider’s massive obsidian sword made a swing for Alicarius’ head, but he jerked his neck back to avoid being decapitated. He raised his own weapon and slashed through his enemy and its mount. Gore and mechanical parts scattered around him, and Alicarius rolled to his feet, slamming his blade into a daemonette too slow to avoid him. Then he was wreathed in blue fire.

He stood his ground, his body battling against the flames’ physical assault and his mind fighting the sorcerous one attempting to consume his soul. He took a step forwards, then another, constantly pushing against the power of the flames, to be confronted with the most bizarre creature possible.

Its body was shifting mass of purple-blue flames, while screaming maws that belched fire twisted and writhed around its body. Alicarius’ halberd slice through it, and it disappeared in a cloud of glittering blue smoke.

He turned as his hyper-enhanced senses picked up the sound of someone moving behind him. He span, storm bolter raised, to see a monstrous creature born of man’s worst nightmares. Similar to some massive, bipedal vulture, the creature’s multicoloured feathers flickered and twitched madly. In one of its clawed hands it held a staff, crackling with sorcerous power.

It was a Lord of Change, a greater daemon of Tzeentch and most powerful of his servants.

Alicarius let of a burst of fire with his storm bolter, the weapon’s immense recoil dampened by the servos contained within his armour, but it was to no avail. Even with the innumerable blessing laid upon them, the explosive bullets could not penetrate the shield of magical power that guarded the daemon. Hefting his halberd, he charged.

His first blow was blocked by the daemon’s staff, but Alicarius could see that its daemonic creature within it was struggling to repulse the holy power of his weapon. He span, allowing his momentum to carry him away from the daemon, before his weapon sliced through the monster’s ankle.

At least, it would have done.

With a boom of air being suddenly misplaced, the daemon disappeared, and reappeared to his left instantaneously.

“Very good, captain!” it roared over din, its beak clacking with every word. “But you won’t kill me that easily.

It leapt forward, attempting to crush him with its taloned feet, but Alicarius had expected this and simply dodged out of the way. He turned, just in time to block the daemon’s descending staff. It withdrew, only to strike again, but Alicarius parried it before charging forward, allowing his weight and momentum to plough him into the monstrous bird-creature. It reacted too slowly, and roared with pain as the sigils and wards upon Alicarius’s shoulder guard touched its skin, burning and blackening it. In return, it sent a blast of warp fuelled lightning towards him, but the same psychic shields that had just hurt it so stopped the attack.

“You cannot beat me,” it shouted. “No-one can beat me!”

“I wouldn’t be so sure!” he shouted.

The daemon raised a multicoloured eyebrow.

“Behind you,” Alicarius murmured.

The daemon turned, cautiously keeping an eye on him to ensure against a surprise attack. Then it saw two grey knights carrying incinerators behind it. It didn’t have time to dodge before burning promethium, mixed with blessed oils and unguents, was pumped directly onto it.

It jerked and spasmed as the hyper-volatile fuel gushed over it, and fell to the floor, writhing in agony. The burning hot assault abated suddenly, and Alicarius nodded his thanks to his two battle-brothers.

“I said you shouldn’t be so sure,” he said, as he walked over to the daemon, his blade raised and readied to deliver the killing blow.

“Neither should you,” the deamon riposted, its beak splitting in a perverse mirror of a grin. A barrier of warp fuelled lightning formed around them, crackling and twisting madly. Alicarius tried to back away, but the lightning would not let him pass, at least, not let him pass without burning him to a crisp.

The light shone brightly over them, dazzling Alicarius even through his helmet’s filters, and the only noise louder than the crackling was the daemon’s laughter.

“You’re coming with me now!” he roared. “I’ll torture your soul for eternity!”

“Never!” Alicarius roared back.

As the warp and reality began to merge around him in the tiny, self contained space, Alicarius did the only thing he could. He turned, sprinted, and plunged his blade into the daemon’s feathered breast, killing both its physical form and the essence of it soul.

And around him, reality shattered in a flash of light, sucking him into the warp.

This post has been edited by The Bean: Feb 22 2009, 04:37 PM

[Colonel Mustard]

Part 25-Mythic Dawn

Baurus was waiting for him back at the Merchant's Inn. Judging by the wary looks the innkeeper was giving him, he knew about the dead body in his cellar, and was also aware that Baurus was a member of the Blades.

“Any luck?” he asked Serrio as he sat down next to him.

“Yep,” Serrio replied. “I got the third book, and take a look at this.”

He handed Baurus the note, who read it over a few times.

“The Elven Garden district's sewers huh?” he asked. “I know just the place it says. And the meeting's soon. We'd best get going if we want to get there on time.”

They hurried through the city as it began to get dark, round the back of a house and to a sewer grate. Baurus lifted it up, trying to ignore the smell, and hurried down the ladder, closely followed by Serrio.

The trip through the sewers was fairly uneventful, only punctuated by a run in with some goblins and a mudcrab. By the time they had arrived at a door that marked their meeting place, both of them were still hot, sweaty and tired-they had trapped heat of fermenting sewage to thank for that.

“This is it,” Baurus said, wiping a film of sweat from his brow. “I've always wondered what the table in here was for.”

“So what's the plan?” Serrio asked.

“I'll head in there to try and get the book,” Baurus replied. “There's to the left door at the top, which leads to a walkway above the room. Get up there and watch the meeting, and stay as backup. If things go wrong, we'll just have to kill this sponsor and take the book.”

“Better than nothing,” Serrio said. “Good luck.”

Serrio headed through the door and up the stairs, lurking in the shadows of the stairwell. Below him, Baurus entered and sat at the table.

From a side door, an altmer, tall and contemptuous, walked in, and gave Baurus a sneering look.

“You will remain silent,” the elf said. “I will explain what it means to join our organisation and then you will tell me if you still wish to join it. Do you understand?”

Baurus nodded obediently.

“Good,” the elf said. He began to drone on about Mehrunes Dagon or some rubbish like that, and Serrio stopped listening as he saw a pair of guards, wearing that strange armour all the Mythic Dawn wore, walk onto the walkway. Serrio shrank into the shadows, reaching towards his sword and dagger.

One of the guards noticed something in the shadows, and drawing his weapon, began to stalk towards Serrio. Baurus pretended not to notice, but let his hand rest on the hilt of his Katana.

The guard reached Serrio's position, but before he could react, Serrio lunged forward, sword and dagger drawn, and plunged them into the man's chest, sending him keeling back, choking on his own blood.

“I told you to come alone!” the outraged elf yelled, but he was stopped speaking by Baurus kicking the table and sending it flying into him. The redguard sprang to his feet to dodge the blast of lightning the prone elf sent at him, then charged, slashing his katana across the altmer's chest.

The second guard had charged forwards into Serrio, and for a minute they duelled, mace against sword, before Serrio smashed the pommel of his sword into the side of his enemy's head and causing him to topple off the bridge. He landed with a painful crunch, his neck at an unnatural angle.

“You alright?” Serrio asked Baurus as he wiped his sword clean of blood.

“I'm fine,” Baurus replied. He slipped his hand into the pockets of the elf's robe, and triumphantly pulled out a slim red book. “Commentaries on the Mythic Dawn, Volume Four,” he announced. “We've got it.”

He handed it over to Serrio.

“Get it back to Tar Meena at the university,” he said. “She'll be pleased to see this.

#

“Tar Meena?” Serrio called out quietly as he entered.

“Ah, Serrio,” Tar Meena said as she saw him. She at a desk in the corner, and the first two volumes of the Commentaries open, and was reading through them. “Did you have any luck getting the third volume?”

“I got three and four!” Serrio announced triumphantly. Tar Meena raised the horny ridges she had instead of eyebrows in surprise.

“You got the fourth volume?” she asked. “Let me see.”

Serrio handed over the slim books, which Tar Meena flicked through with an air of scholarly excitement.

“Give me a few days to study the books and I ought to have found out more about the Mythic Dawn,” she said, snout already buried in the third volume. “I think they have a code in them about where they are, as a kind of test for those wanting to join. If I'm right, then I ought to be able to point you in the direction of their headquarters.”

Serrio nodded and left her to her work, and off went to get a celebratory drink.

#

A few days later, and Serrio was back at the Arcane University again, look for Tar Meena. He found her at the same desk, looking tired but triumphant.

“I cracked the code,” she announced proudly as Serrio approached. “It was simple really-all the first letters of each paragraph added up to say 'Green Emperor Way, where tower touches midday sun.' I worked it out-it's at midday, by the tomb of Prince Camaril.”

“How clever,” Serrio murmured, before suddenly realising something. “It's midday now! I'd best go.”

He dashed out of the building with a yell of “Thanks again!” and to the Green Emperor's Way.

His mad sprint bought him to Green Emperor's Way just in time. He looked for the grave and quickly found it-a large mausoleum with Prince Camarail inscribed in large letters on it.

He walked around it a few times, but couldn't find anything on it that could indicate the location of a Mythic Dawn base. Then, when the sun reached its zenith, glowing red lines formed on one side of the tomb, away from the main path that most people would take. The lines formed a map of the eastern half of Cyrodiil. A large outline of a town formed, with golden letters proclaiming it as Cheyindal, while to the north a dot formed, marked out as Lake Arrius Caverns.

So that was the place he needed to go, Serrio mused. Well, Alicarius had sent him to find the cultists. Now he had done so, Alicarius could damn well clear them out of there himself. And good luck to him.