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First Pacification of Luna

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First Pacification of Luna
Conflict Great Crusade / Unification Wars
Date ~703.M30[6]
Location Luna
Outcome Imperial victory
Combatants
Imperium Selenar
Commanders
Emperor
Praetor Maral Lupus[7]
Matriarch Heliosa-54[2a]
Strength
VII Legion
XIII Legion
XVI Legion
Cybernetic army
Casualties
Unknown, presumably light to moderate Unknown, presumably heavy

The First Pacification of Luna saw the complete subjugation of Terra's moon, Luna, by the early Legiones Astartes. The first true battle of the Great Crusade, the subjugation of Luna allowed the Emperor to use its advanced genetics facilities to mass-produce His Space Marines.[1]

Prelude

Being the first battle the Legiones Astartes fought outside of Terran skies, it was launched while the Unification Wars on Earth itself were still coming to a conclusion. The forces of the Emperor had already made great headway on Terra's surface, though the forces of the stubborn Cardinal Tang still held a number of fortress zones and enclaves.[1]

At this point, Luna was dominated by the Selenar gene-cults which believed that human nature was fractal, fractured, and transcendent. To them, the true nature of mankind was visible in the flesh and mind of the individual, but that each person was an echo of archetypes that persisted throughout human existence.[1] The cults were extremely ancient, having existed in many forms since the dawn of humanity. They had become the rulers of Luna during the Age of Strife, and were led by women who would clone themselves to make scientific advancements which required several lifetimes for research.[2a][2b] Each cult clung to a different set of archetypes: some represented as anthropomorphic figures, some as numbers, and some simply as symbols. These fanatical cults were nonetheless capable gene-forgers and geneticists who operated out of massive subterranean laboratories the Emperor coveted for His own plan to mass produce His Adeptus Astartes.[1] However, the Selenar were united in their view of the Emperor as only the latest incarnation of a long line of male, short-sighted tyrants, and refused to work with the Imperium.[2a][2b]

War

After failing subdue and control the gene-cults diplomatically, the Emperor turned to a military option. The final straw came when the gene-cults returned one of the Emperor's emissaries as a still-screaming soup of fused flesh and metal. The Emperor deployed three Space Marine Legions, VII Legion, XIII Legion, and XVI Legion, each far smaller than it would be during the Great Crusade.[1]

Legion XVI acted as the force's vanguard, launching itself towards Luna from Earth-based rockets.[1] This vanguard was commanded by Praetor Maral Lupus, "the White Wolf".[7] Behind them came smaller waves from the VIIth and XIIIth Legions. The formidable ground based defenses on the surface of Luna controlled by the gene-cults opened fire. The Emperor used Legions VII and XIII as distractions, allowing Legion XVI to land assault craft unnoticed. The Astartes quickly moved into the gene-cults underground complexes, battling half-machine genetic monstrosities. These initial positions fell within seconds, with the hundred or so cultists inside dead before even realizing they were under direct assault. The Astartes disabled the cultists' orbital defenses from inside, allowing Legions VII and XIII to land and begin a systematic annihilation of all their remaining resistance. The battle only lasted six hours before all resistance on Luna crumbled. The surviving gene-cultists surrendered, begging that the Emperor "call off his wolves". The now-humbled gene-crafters of Luna would be granted mercy, but were enslaved by the Emperor for His own plans.[1]

Aftermath

From the moment of their surrender, however, the Selenar would continue to oppose the Emperor in other ways: In an act of spite, the ruling Matriarch Heliosa-54 ordered one of her followers to hide the extremely powerful Magna Mater from the Imperium during the First Pacification and then deleted her memories; thus the Imperium did not acquire all of the Selenar research.[2a] Later on, the Selenar effectively poisoned the III Legion with a disease known as "the Blight".[3] This opposition led the Imperium to purge the Selenar in another campaign;[4] much of what remained of the cults sided with the traitors during the Horus Heresy.[5]

Sources