"A Siphon of Blood will create rivers of flowing crimson, he will construct out of the bones of his enemies a pure mockery of the Golden Throne, and atop it he will sit and observe the glorious victory within his grasp."~ Champion Leonothas Kargan, the Red Wolf
~ Appearance:
Standing nearly seven and a half feet tall, his body is a hulking mass of bulging muscles with long, powerful limbs and thick hands that could easily crush a man's skull with minimal effort. The nails of his finger have grown rather large and dark, each forming into a sharp point. They bear a striking resemblance to claws. His skin is a light olive and is covered in thick patches of coarse black hair; around his chest, back, arms, and hands especially; though recently areas of hard red-brown scales have begun to appear on the base of his neck and around his shoulders and thighs. His scalp is the only part of his body that is hairless, though dozens of outdated implant cables meant to connect to his power armor and similar interfaces almost give him the appearance of having silver dreadlocks. Thick jagged eyebrows are angled over his bright golden eyes and his thin-lipped mouth, which droops at the edges to form a perpetual grimace, is filled with several sharpened fangs.
In his power armor, his physique becomes all the more terrifying. Giant plates of jagged red and black metal adorn his body, each outlined in rusted, stained brass. Upon his shoulders and his knee plates is the terrifying symbol of his chapter: the circle of chaos becoming an inhuman fanged maw that is closing upon an indistinct world. Twisted metal spikes line his jump-pack and each of his forearms is wrapped in thick metal chain that extends around his weapons of battle; a simple, but effective way to make sure they are not lost when the blood rage fills his mind.
~ Equipment/Weapons Loadout: Mark VI Veteran Power Armor, Valkyris Pattern Jump Pack, Umbra-Pattern Bolt Pistol, Corrupted Frost Blade: Khornesgrin.
All equipment was ‘stolen’ from the Space Wolves Chapter and have thus become tainted by the ruinous powers, in particular the chain sword. It was once known as ‘Wintermaw’, a relic Frost Blade made of an ancient alloy decorated in icy blue power runes made from energy crystal that glowed with power and fitted with the teeth of a Fenrisian Ice Kraken. Its hilt was formed into a wolf’s head, large jaw seeming to bear the blade between its fangs. Truly, it was a prized weapon of the Space Wolves and was thus bestowed upon Leonothas with great honors.
It has since succumbed to the dark blood rituals of Chaos: the teeth and runes of the weapon now bare a sinister crimson glow and the wolf’s head hilt has lost its noble air, becoming a fierce and feral creature with slathering mouth hanging open in twisted rage. When used in combat, one would swear it drips with vile spittle as if the weapon itself craves blood and flesh.
~ Psychological Profile:
When out of combat, Leonothas is surprisingly calm and collected; a shrewd commander and cunning tactician. He rarely displays emotion besides annoyance or anger and looks to those he determines to be ‘weak’ with disdain, while simultaneously hating those who prey on such weakness. This air of a noble and honorable warrior is often shaken, however, when he becomes inflicted by vivid hallucinations of people from his past: usually his dead wife and son. Unable to tell the difference between them and reality, their presence is a powerful corrupting influence on his mind and sanity. In his more controlled times, he believes that through a warriors death he can someday join them within the Blood God and so seeks to best as many warriors as possible.
”You say that my God is one of murder… of war… of death incarnate… Yet I say he a God of life, for all that truly lives can bleed and that blood is precious to them. It is precious to Him also. He holds the blood of my family, now, and someday he will hold mine as well. Until then… you will make a worthy sacrifice.”When battle is joined, an entirely different side of Leonothas is shown: one of pure bestial fury and rage, of red-hot burning hatred for any and all things, and a sadistic joy in the sight of the spray of blood. Hallucinations and delusions run rampant as the monstrous warrior cuts a swath through anything that is foolish enough to stand before him, becoming stronger and stronger the longer combat lasts. Even his own warriors know better than to approach Leonothas when he falls into such a way for they are well aware that his murderous intent will only abate when no more victims are left breathing.
"Hack! Slash! Burn! Bleed! Kill them all, leave none standing! KILL! KILL! KILL!"~ Biography:
Like all other Space Wolves before him, Leonothas was born on Fenris to a small outlying tribe of nomad hunter-gatherers. He was strong in his youth; a capable hunter, though never a warrior, and much loved by his people. There was a time when he was disappointed that the ‘Sky Warriors’ never saw fit to choose him for their ranks, but that quickly passed as the task of surviving the harsh and unforgiving world was ever present. At 16 he married the love of his life, a girl from a neighboring friendly tribe, and within two years she bore him a son.
It was the happiest time of his life, but was doomed to end in blood.
In 968.M21, Fenris was infiltrated by a cult of Khorne and several of the Fenrisian tribes succumbed to its dark influence. One such tribe, led by the cultist who’d instigated the planet’s ‘conversion’, sought to make a worthy sacrifice to their new god and so descended upon Leonothas’ tribe in the dead of night. The smaller group of nomads put up a noble fight but was clearly fighting a losing battle and in the heat of it all Leonothas’ wife and son were slain. This sent the warrior into a rage and he cut a bloody swath through the enemy; personally lopping the head off the cultist leader. Just before the remaining tribesmen descended upon him the great scream of jump packs filled the air and much to everyone’s amazement and fear a squadron of Sky Warriors was in their midst. The Space Wolves had been well aware of the cult spreading upon their home and had been monitoring the behavior of each tribe from their Fortress Monetary. Wars between the tribals were not uncommon, but this particular conflict came from no apparent blood feud or territory war and so immediately caught their suspicion. Preparing their forces from the shadows, they sought to use the small tribe as a distraction until the leader revealed himself, though they had been too slow to reach him before Leonothas did. Within a matter of minutes the Space Marines had slaughtered the corrupted tribe to the last man.
Though most Chapter recruits were taken at an earlier age, they looked favorably upon Leonothas for his display in battle and so took him with them to the Monestary to both interrogate him regarding the cult and to, possibly, put him into the next group of recruits. He passed their trials and survived their augmentations, all the while being harshly indoctrinated with the ideals of one who ‘serves the God Emperor and mankind’. Before long, all memory of his previous life had vanished and he found himself a fierce and honorable Space Marine of the Space Wolves Chapter.
For nearly 30 years he served on the front lines of the Chapter, distinguishing himself for his fearlessness, his battle lust, and his skills in close-range combat and was eventually promoted into the Skyclaws as the leader of an assault squad. Here his accolades only grew as he gained victory of victory against the enemies of man, even having the relic Frost Blade ’Wintermaw’ bestowed upon him. Near the end of the millennium, he found himself in Cadia as part of the Chapter battlegroup defending the sector. Leading the defenders of one of the hive worlds, Leonothas found himself separated from his unit and injured by the round of a chaos bolter. He would likely have perished there on the street if not for the aid of a kind civilian who, with the help of her family, took him into hiding. He was amazed at the mortal’s bravery and something about her appearance gave him pause, though he knew not what it was. After a time, he was nursed back to health and was able to rejoin his battle brothers, leading a heroic counter-attack that sent the enemy running. His elation at this victory was short lived, however, when the Chapter command came down that they were to evacuate the planet and leave the populace. Leonothas fiercely protested, thinking of the woman who had saved him, saying that billions of innocent lives would be lost and that if they were only able to attack the enemy head on they would surely emerge the victor. The order was final, as command saw the planet beyond redemption and deserving only of an orbital cleansing that would reduce everything to ash.
As the majority of his forces were being pulled out, Leonothas disobeyed a direct order and led a small squad of volunteers back to the planet’s surface, hoping to reach the planetary comm. system and announce the planet-wide evacuation. Fighting from street corner to street corner, they stopped to rescue the family that had saved Leonothas and eventually made it to the station, barricading themselves inside. Before the announcement could be made the orbital cleansing began and the honorable Space Marine knew that they would soon die from the bombardment, sacrifices of the cowardly Imperium. It was at that moment that Abbaddon’s ritual was completed several planets away and the entire system became another part of the Eye of Terror. The cleansing ceased as the new warp storm raged around the planet and in the lull, Leonothas looked down to the woman who he’d been shielding but found that she was already dead; her weaker body had been broken by the concussive force of the Imperial bombardment. In that moment, the greater part of his Space Marine indoctrination failed and the memories of his past life came rushing back. This caused him to realize why this woman felt so important to him: she was a spitting image of the wife he had lost long ago. For the second time, the Emperor had betrayed him and let those he cared for die out of simple cowardice. If the Sky Warriors had only fought back on Fenris, his wife might still be alive. If the Space Wolves had only fought on Cadia, this innocent woman might still be alive.
This loss broke his mind and he flew into a blinding rage just as the forces of Chaos finally regrouped and descended upon the station. He slaughtered them as they came, wave after wave, until his blue-grey armor was stained red and dripped blood as he ran until finally they overwhelmed him through sheer force of numbers. Had these foes been ‘normal’ heretics they might have slain him right then and there, but these were ’World Eaters’ and they valued anyone who could fight with such bloodthirsty rage. For the second time in his life, he was taken from a pile of his enemy’s corpses only this time he needed no brutal indoctrination, no wiping of his memory. From that day onward, Leonothas’ sole purpose was revenge against the weak Imperium that would hide behind a shield of unarmed civilians.
His fearsome rage and bloodlust only grew as the years passed and more and more red and brass armored warriors fell in behind him. They followed the flow of war, from one planet to the next, until finally the planet ‘Vigil’ was in their sights.
- Kargan's Following; Thousands of heretical space marines follow behind the Red Wolf, their thirst for blood growing ever dire as the closer they get to Vigil.
- The Blood Wolves; The red and brass that followed Kargan's conquest weren't the only Chaos marines to take notice. In the shadows a reclusive traitorous legion, responsible for the massacre of billions across the Ultima Segmentum, made themselves known. The Blood Wolves, heretical Space Wolves who've sworn themselves to Khorne, met Kargan upon a world mere days before making the jump to Vigil. They bowed before him, surrendering their total allegiance to his cause.
- The
Skull Throne; When Kargan and his newfound Blood Wolves made the jump through the Warp on their route to Vigil, a strange happening occurred. Their ships had suddenly vanished, and they had been relatively suspended in mid-air, observing the encroaching dark void that began to envelop them. They had all nearly suffocated within the confines of a freezing, empty atmosphere, before lights suddenly flickered on. Kargan and his wolves found themselves within what appeared to be a massive space hulk, adorned in skulls, bones and markings of Khorne. The ship's structure itself was relatively flush and organized, matching no known form of battleship in any recorded data. Within the core of the ship was an elegant gothic-style fountain of blood, with a tremendously large and vivid statue of the Lord of Blood himself.
- The Cult of Kharneth; As Kargan's personal crusade of blood led him to Vigil, his acts did not go unnoticed. Hundreds of thousands of cultists have amassed into a single gathering, boarding dozens of battle barges donning the Mark of Khorne as they follow the
Skull Throne into battle.
- The Iron Bones Traitor Legion; Upon one such battle barge a legion of traitorous guardsmen await a glorious battle. Clad in iron helmets and armor, their makeshift weaponry and unmanaged firearms prove surprisingly and lethally effective against enemy infantry.
- Iron Bone's Blessed Armored Divisions; Blessed by the Lord of Blood & Skulls, nearly a hundred daemonic engines are operated by the Iron Bones guardsmen. Additionally, dozens of stolen and acquired chimeras and leman russ tanks are also operated within the divisions.
- The Unbound Hordes of Blood; Within the
Skull Throne lies a watery portal of a crimson shade from which endless legions of khornate daemons spawn.
- The Wolves of Kharneth; One of many gifts supplied to Kargan on the
Skull Throne. A pack of eight tremendous wolves, Fenrisian in nature, loyally serve their new master. Blood and saliva constantly oozes from their massive jaws, their mangy fur thin enough to see the outline of their thick bones. Blades and bullets seem to absorb into their flesh, as they pounce and devour any threat to their master at will.