The Complete History of the Khertet Dynasty
Today's article will be a complete history of my Khertet Dynasty that has been written on the lead up to the Grand Narrative event. This comprehensive catalogue of events cover everything, from before the War in Heaven to the Reclamation Wars and the upcoming campaign in Kassandras. There is some suspiciously absent information as the Reclamation of Orberus crusade campaign still rages on.
So strap yourselves in, this is going to be one heck of a long post...
GENESIS OF THE KHERTET DYNASTY
During the indisputable reign of the Necrontyr, long before War in Heaven had even been conceived as an idea by Szarekh the Silent King, the Khertet Dynasty were infamous amongst its rival Dynasties for the ruthless and oftimes unpredictable sieges they would launch against their kin in a never ending crusade for power and glory. So great was the might of the Khertet Dynasty that their numbers spanned a great many star systems, most of which had been pried from the clutches of other Dynasties. Meanwhile Szarazs, the Phaeron of the Khertet Dynasty at the height of their power, selfishly hoarded almost all of the spoils of war that his mighty armies had claimed for himself, relinquishing only a small share of his riches to the nobility that he had personally favored, most notably his most prodigious commanders and noble siblings Nemekh and Phaen who were commonly known as the Khertet Gemini. Many of the commoners under Szarazs’s rule lived in poverty with only the most cunning and ruthless amongst them able to live in relative comfort.
Over time however, the Phaeron’s sanity went into decline. What started as minor bouts of paranoia that assassins would claim his life because of his infamy slowly escalated into full blown delusions that the incarnation of death itself was coming for him, dressed in a hooded cloak as black as midnight and wielding a mighty scythe with which to tear his soul from his physical form. He became a recluse for a time and Thead, the Phaeron’s own personal Apothecary, diligently sought to find a way to cure his master’s madness but with little success. After a time, Szarazs emerged from his chambers having reached a conclusion on how to stave off the grim reaper haunting his dreams - to dedicate the deaths of the Necrontyr they slaughtered as sacrifices to appease its lust for souls.
THE ACQUISITION OF KHARIMEKH
Though Szarazs’s declaration of war against his own kind didn’t appear to be any different from his previous crusade of conquest, there were two differences in the methods he deployed against his enemies, of which he had many. The first were the obsidian masks he forced all save the Khertet nobility to wear in battle, another delusional belief the Phaeron had that the reaper he was trying to appease would only show favour to those whose faces it could see and therefore spare the lives of both himself and his chosen. The second was that instead of assimilating the Dynasties he had conquered into the Khertet’s numbers as he once did, he now cared only for their destruction.
During their campaign of annihilation, the Khertet Dynasty happened across a vault planet belonging to the Nihilakh Dynasty and overseen by the Lord Kharimekh. When they had reached the colossal vault itself, Szarazs had found all the Necrontyr dead save for Lord Kharimekh himself, flanked by a large number of Canoptek Wraith units. Kharimekh explained that he knew of the Phaeron’s coming and swore servitude to the Khertet Dynasty, offering the deaths of his kin as proof of his loyalty. In his madness, Szarazs welcomed Kharimekh into his Dynasty without question and, in time, Kharimekh became the royal vizier of the Phaeron having advised the weaknesses of his subsequent enemies with unnerving accuracy that specifically drew the suspicions of commanders Nemekh and Phaen.
In reality, Kharimekh’s brain chemistry had been altered by the severed head of an alien prophet that the Nihilakh Dynasty kept buried in his vaults. Through means unknown, even to the present day, it’s ability to see the future had somehow been transferred to the former Nihilakh Lord. He not only witnessed the coming of the Khertet Dynasty and the slaughter that would come about from that, but he also glimpsed a future where they would inhabit immortal bodies and the Khertet would become the unwitting war hounds of the Silent King. Hoping to help guide his new Dynasty into the era he had foreseen, Kharimekh commanded the vault’s Canoptek constructions to kill every Necrontyr in the vault other than himself - his kin were dead either way, at least this way he could infiltrate their Invader’s numbers and act as an double agent for the Silent King himself, a secret even Szarekh himself is unaware of.
THE WAR IN HEAVEN & THE FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH THE C'TAN
When Szarekh had given the command for the Necrontyr to declare war against the Old Ones, Szarazs remained non-compliant and dismissive for a short while, an attitude that would’ve surely seen his Dynasty eradicated under the full might of the Silent King’s absolute authority. It was Kharimekh that had convinced the Phaeron join his kin in the War in Heaven, reasoning that the Death that still pursued him in his dreams cared little about whose deaths were committed in tribute to it, borrowing and adapting an adage he had glimpsed from an enemy far into the future. The Phaeron relented and reluctantly joined the War in Heaven alongside the entirety of the Necrontyr, but the war had resulted in the deaths of many Khertet soldiers, the first failing of Kharimekh’s advisement in his eyes but a success in the ex-Nihilakh Lord’s. When the Necrontyr realised their war against the Old Ones was moot, the Khertet Dynasty were amongst the first to reignite the infighting that the Silent King had long sought to quash.
It was after this failed attempt to destroy the Old Ones that the Deceiver made itself known to the Necrontyr race, and promised them immortal bodies with which to combat their enemies. At first, Szarazs was terrified at the prospect of the C’tan seeking them out, interpreting the one known as the Nightbringer to be the entity that plagued his nightmares and believed that he had finally come to claim his life. This terror was short lived however and he came to relish the idea of the immortality the star gods now offered him, interpreting it as a reward from the god of death himself for the tributes of kin he had struck down in his name and as such was one of the first to willfully feed himself into the furnaces to begin the process of bio transference. This however was not enough to slake the Phaeron’s murder lust for the seed had been planted and would eventually see him going down the path of the Destroyer Cults. Some of the nobility, especially Nemekh, would come to wonder if the Nightbringer had covertly created the Destroyers by design given how their Phaeron had fallen so deep into the madness.
FALL OF THE C'TAN & THE GREAT SLEEP
During the second war against the Old Ones, now with the aid of the C’tan and their new bodies, the Khertet Dynasty fought with renewed ferver, though Szarazs’s reason to fight was no longer fuelled by his fear of death but rather his dedication to the gods that had granted him immortality, but in his blind zealotry he neglected to realise C’tan’s true intentions, even when the Silent King himself had realised the curse that the star gods had afflicted their race with. It was due to Nemekh’s brilliant strategic planning that their Dynasty, which made up a large number of the wider Necron forces, were in the perfect position to strike down the C’tan after the Old Ones had fallen, and with the aid of the Technomancer Baltha’Zyr they were able to shackle a great number of C’tan Shards to their will, particularly those of the Burning One who was not only present amongst the majority of the Khertet forces at the end of the war but whose shards would soon be trapped within the hearts of the Khertet tombs and used as a power source for the Dynasty in its entirety.
With the Old Ones defeated and the Aeldari threatening a war that the Necrons were not ready to fight, the Khertet Dynasty went to rest in their tombs as the Silent King had demanded of all his subjects, his command protocols overriding those of even the mightiest of Phaerons, ready for the day they would be summoned from their rest once more…
REAWAKENING & THE RISE OF A NEW PHAERON
It had been Kharimekh who was first to awaken from his Tomb World having been stirred from his slumber by the tomb’s Canoptek constructs shortly after the complex had been infiltrated by a group of Ork Lootaz. The Necron Lord barely escaped the Ork’s attack, surrendering the tomb to the alien threat and retreating through the planet’s Dolmen Gate to begin his search for the Overlord who would, according to his visions, lead the Khertet Dynasty down the path to becoming an instrumental force of destruction in service to the Silent King, whether consciously or not. However, Kharimekh did not at this time know the whereabouts of this Overlord’s Tomb World and, as much as he loathed the thought of any defects in his logic engrams, he was not capable enough to lead the Khertet forces alone.
With only a few dim visions of being led to the prophesied Overlord by another, Kharimekh, now known as “The First”, journeyed to the Segmentum Obscurus and the frozen Tomb World of Ripekh where he discovered that millenia ago the Khertet Dynasty had taken a stand on this very planet against the Old Ones and the C’tan both, led by the infamous Nemekh the Summoner and their merciless under Lord Zharakeph the Indiscriminate. It was there that Kharimekh enacted the Reawakening Protocols and revived the two nobles along with a handful of Crypteks including the Technomancer Baltha’Zyr the Enslaver and Plasmancer Rakantyr the Baleful, both of whom were known to have a turbulent relationship with one another as they attempted to discover the secrets of the Burning One together.
In their Hubris, Nemekh declared themselves the new Phaeron of the Khertet Dynasty and stated their relief that Szarazs had been lost to the skeins of time. Whilst the old Phaeron had led the Dynasty down a path of mindless and indiscriminate destruction to feed his delusions, Nemekh had sworn on their honour to focus the Dynasty on conquest and to reclaim the power and glory the Khertet wielded prior the the Great Sleep, much of which had been lost in the millenia that followed.
IMPERIUM NIHILUS & ULTRUS PRIME
Whilst the Khertet Dynasty fought a number of successful battles on many different planets in their quest to reclaim their assets, it wasn’t until they had answered the Silent King’s call and journeyed to the Nephilim Sector that they became infamous to the Imperium of mankind, where Szarekh himself had tasked Nemekh with the expansion of the Pariah Nexus knowing the Khertet Dynasty’s reputation for their relentless advances and merciless war doctrines. This had in turn led Nemekh and their forces to the Orberus Sector and the planet Python IV where they had successfully conquered the Imperial Forces there despite the efforts of the Dark Angels and their successor chapters. It was here that Baltha’Zyr the Enslaver had happened upon an ancient, Necron artifact of unknown capabilities that captured the Cryptek’s interest, and he along with Nemekh became obsessed with discovering the artifact’s secrets.
Identifying the artifact from his visions with sudden clarity having laid eyes upon it personally, Kharimekh the First conspired in secret with Baltha’Zyr to manipulate the Phaeron’s attention to the planet of Ultrus Prime in the Imperium Nihilus by claiming that the secrets of the artifact could be found upon that planet, when in reality he already known the artifact to be the Crucible of Nehekh, an artifact that allowed small scale instantaneous transportation through the Dolmen Gates using the composition of Necrodermis as an catalyst. Unlike Nemekh, Baltha’Zyr knew that Kharimekh held the secrets to the artifact but also knew the Lord would not divulge them until the Khertet Tombs on Ultrus Prime had been fully reawakened.
Nemekh assembled a small task force that included the Lord Zarakeph and Baltha’Zyr himself and, against the orders of the Silent King, abandoned their advance in the Orberus Sector leaving Kharimekh in command of the Pariah Nexus forces. Upon arrival on Ultrus Prime, Nemekh found their efforts hindered by the unexpected mobilisation of Imperial Forces, including several Orders of Adepta Sororitas and a contingency of Blood Angels, yet the efforts of the Imperium did not seem to be directed at the Necrons but rather they appeared to regard them as an inconvenience. It wasn’t until Baltha’Zyr had informed the Phaeron about the Khertet tombs beneath them and their subsequent attempt to reactivate them that they had come to realise that the real threat to this world were a warband of Thousand Sons after they had launched an attack on the Necrons, presumably to prevent the Necron complex below them from powering up. The Khertet Dynasty were subsequently overwhelmed and were swiftly defeated the the Rubicae that made up the Chaos forces.
PELETESZ THE WRETCHED
Having suffered total annihilation at the hands of the Thousand Sons, the Khertet forces on Ultrus Prime found themselves phasing out into the tomb's below them, though it only appeared partially activated with parts of the tomb cut off due to seismic activity over the millenia. It was here that Peletesz the Wretched, a Harbinger of Transmogrification and rival Technomancer to Baltha’Zyr, made his presence known to Nemekh and their forces having tracked their progress from the moment they made planet fall. Peletesz had devised a way to enter and reactivate the parts of the tomb that had been cut off from them and so directed the Khertet forces remotely, gathering various data from each skirmish as he did so. This led the Khertet forces through several warzones including the Imperial capital city of Nihmian’s Pass, a gigantic city that had been built between two mighty mountains, and through a Daemonic Incursion where they had lost Zarakeph the Indiscriminate amongst the chaos.
In the end however, Nemekh’s efforts were in vain. When they finally reached the activation nodes to fully reawaken their forces, they found themselves once again under attack by the Thousand Sons, seemingly still intent on preventing the Khertet Dynasty from completing their objective. So vicious was the Chaos counter attack that the Necrons were damaged beyond their innate reanimation capabilities. With the tombs beneath them inactive, and with no Canoptek constructs active to repair their battered Necrodermis corpses, the Khertet Dynasty’s advance had been halted indefinitely…
THE TYRANID INVASION OF ULTRUS PRIME
Two solar cycles had passed. The ultimate defeat of Nemekh and their forces had been foreseen by Kharimekh the First, and his conspired his next move with the Chronomancer Eratoth the Enfeebled who had also prophesied as much. They had elected to await the fated day that they were to abandon their efforts in the Orberus Sector and journey to Ultrus Prime themselves in order to complete the final stages of the plans they had set in motion, specifically when the convergence of a number of Hive Fleets would discover and descend upon the planet. Kharimekh used the Xenos invasion as a bargaining chip to form an uneasy alliance with the Imperium, a tactic that the famed Anrakyr the Traveller himself used during the invasion of Baal. In return he asked that they be allowed to awaken their tombs uninterrupted and leave the system peacefully to which the Imperium reluctantly agreed.
For a time Kharimekh played along with the alliance he had forged. It had not escaped his notice however that a large number of his forces had been falling to the Destroyer Curse, more than is typical among the Necrons, and he had quickly realised that there was only one way this could happen. Utilising the Convergence Node built by the rival Arkos Dynasty who had also emerged on the planet, and aided by the recently resurrected Zarakeph who had succumb to the Destroy Curse himself over the years, the Khertet forces barely succeeded in their mission but were able to power the nodes and summon the cause of the Destroyer epidemic - the Ex-Phaeron turned Skorpekh Lord Szarazs, whose superior Command Protocols had been issuing the signal to all Khertet units nearby to destroy everything in their path.
To slake his murder lust, Szarazs was directed along with his army of Destroyers to take out the swarms of Tyranids to the north that were now swarming the site of the tombs that Nemekh had sought out several cycles back. Kharimekh cared little for the fate of Destroyers however, he merely needed to distract the Tyranids whilst he made his way to the tombs where he was able to finally activate the crypts and recover the Overlord Phaen. Better still, the activation of the Khertet tombs allowed the Spyders there to recover and enact the Resurrection Protocols of Nemekh and their battered forces.
With their forces fully replenished, the Khertet Dynasty made their way east where the Imperial forces had been battling the true threat that had been plaguing the planet for many cycles - the Thousand Sons. Led by the incredible powerful Sorcerer, Othar the Oathbreaker, the Chaos warband had finally claimed the Daemonic artifact known as the Liber Infernus, a book of rituals that allowed him to open the warp and summon a Lord of Change despite the best efforts of the Imperium and the Inquisition. Nemekh the Summoner had held a grudge with the Rubric since their defeat two solar cycles prior and was determined to destroy them once and for all.
By this point, Kharimekh had divulged the secrets of the Crucible of Nehekh to Baltha’Zyr who still carried the artifact all these cycles and, utilising it’s abilities, had summoned a C’tan Shard of the Void Dragon to combat the Greater Daemon. Despite this, Othar’s enhanced mastery of the warp ultimately trumped the Necrons and their forces were forced to retreat. In the dying embers of the battle however, Szarazs, having slaughtered his way through hordes of Tyranid organisms, had appeared on the battlefield and bested the mighty Othar in combat with his Hyperphase Reaper, putting an end to the Sorcerer once and for all. With the Imperium victorious over the Tyranid invasion, the Khertet honoured their promise and departed the planet peacefully.
JUDGEMENT OF THE TRIARCH
THE RECLAMATION WAR
War broke out across the system with the Necrons and the Imperium fighting in key locations across multiple planets in a perpetual battle to take back the territories both sides had previously claimed. This came to be known in time as the Reclamation War.
In the early stages of mankind’s counter offensive, Nemekh devised an interplanetary strategy to confuse and confound their enemies whereby the Khertet Dynasty would make planet fall on and attempt to conquer multiple planets within the Orberus Sector. The Phaeron did not actually believe their attempts take control of multiple planets simultaneously would ever succeed, on the contrary they fully expected these attempts to fail, for the true purpose of these attacks was to merely distract their enemies whilst the Khertet assassins group known as the “Guild of Shadows”, led by the Overlord Banityn the Hidden conducted reconnaissance on the Imperial base of operations on Venom. This strategy extended to the encroaching Necron force known as the Reticent Host who invaded every planet en route to Venom to further confound the Imperium as to the true goal of the Silent King’s forces.
Whilst a spearhead of Imperial forces consisting of the Space Marine Chapters the Angels of Vengeance and the Watchers of the Fall, as well as several regiments of the Nulla Facultan 1st and a group of Mechanicus Skitarii warriors attacked the planet of Python III in an attempt to shatter the Necron’s front lines, the combined might of the Khertet Dynasty and the Reticent Host utilised the Imperium’s diverted focus to launch an attack on two key planets. The first was the Imperial World of Veil’s Reach which had fallen victim to a full scale Tyranid invasion where, once again, Szarazs and his Destroyer Cult had been deployed. The second was the moon of Venom itself where upon the Khertet Dynasty unleashed the might of the Void Dragon for the first time since Ultrus Prime, commanding the C’tan Shard to disintegrate the Mechanicus forges there to hinder the Imperial war efforts. Despite being met with resistance from the Space Marine Chapter, Angels of Absolution, the Necrons emerged victorious as the manufactorums broke down to a molecular level and subsequently absorbed into the Void Dragon.
+++DATABASE INCOMPLETE+++
THE KASSANDRAS SYSTEM
Now, the Khertet Dynasty have set their sights on the Kassandras System, primarily to recover what technology lay within the Massif Ballistus, otherwise known as the “Great Gun”. The expedition, though commanded from orbit through their Phaeron Nemekh the Summoner, is being led by the Cryptek Conclave of the Dynasty, though each Cryptek have their own agendas in the study of the super weapon. For Baltha’Zyr the Enslaver and his rival Peletesz the Wretched, this is merely a quest for knowledge, both seeking to understand the weapon’s functions and origins before the other to laud their discovery over their fellow Technomancer. Rakantyr the Baleful seeks only the gauge the destructive capabilities of the Massif Ballistus, whilst Thead the Ethereal, in his obsession of studying the psychology of organic beings, wishes the study the effects that living under such a weapon of mass destruction has on the creatures of flesh. Eratoth the Enfeebled, as always, remains enigmatic as to his motives, such is the way of the Chronomancer.
With the scale of the war raging throughout the Kassandras System, Nemekh the Summoner has reluctantly found themselves in need of allies. Their general hatred of Chaos, particularly following the ordeal on Ultrus Prime, has automatically ruled out any cooperation with the Ruinous Power, and their war with Imperium in the Orberus Sector had shattered any hope of aligning with mankind. With no-one else to turn to, the Khertet Dynasty has entered an uneasy alliance with the other races that oppose both enemy factions, including the ancient enemies of the Aeldari and rival Dynasties who no doubt remember the destruction Szarazs had wrought on them during the time of flesh.
It mattered little. So long as the Khertet Dynasty retrieved the data they sought in the Kassandras System they could leave the other races to squabble amongst themselves, such was the pettiness of the lesser races.
The war, as ever, continues to rage on…
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