“Gather tears for the sins of ye fathers, o children of Askellon.”
–Valerius, Introit to the Apocrypha Askellios
Like the origins of the Imperium itself, historical truths surrounding the beginnings of the Askellon Sector have long since devolved over the millennia into myths and legends. Even these tales have become splintered, with many worlds and denominations holding their own unique beliefs. Most of the legends, though, hold certain areas in common, to an extent that most across the sector believe them as uncontested truths. These cherished beliefs on the origins of Askellon help bind the sector together in its continual and unstinting service to the Emperor. Taught on almost every world herein, they show a history older than the Imperium of Man itself, that only became more grand once it united with the Emperor’s divine purpose. It is one of uninterrupted loyalty, faithfulness, and devotion to the Emperor and His subjects, and none would dare whisper otherwise.
The Founding
Though the founding of the sector is shrouded with the ashes of history, most of the endlessly copied records indicate it occurred during the ages before the Imperium rose, when humanity seeded itself across the stars. The epic saga Lay of Askellios contains this commonly held recital, though many hold it to be allegory and not a factual accounting. Its most famous copy, a gilded tome many metres tall enshrined in a massive stasis chamber on Juno, relates of a huge fleet arriving after a long, perilous journey to a region of space unmarred by storms. Finding the area peaceful and unsullied, they decided to build a grand civilisation and await other ships to eventually arrive. Stable Warp routes connected a handful of worlds, and the fleet split to settle them.
For reasons that many of the tales refuse to codify, one ship refused this scheme and the others turned on it, refusing to allow it to hinder this grand vision. Myths state it was filled with sinners and heretics, and though heavily damaged it managed to get away, never seen again. The settled worlds grew and prospered, though, mastering the space around them into a stable union that managed to weather the terrible Age of Strife. For generations it remained isolated, until the blessed day when the one of the nascent Imperium’s Expeditionary Fleets arrived as part of the Great Crusade.
Compliance brought the region, now named Askellon, into the Imperium. Some of the legends of this time consist of nothing but tales of the grand ceremonies that many hold lasted several years and included the unnamed Space Marine Legions accompanying the Imperial fleet. They also relate of scattered worlds attempting to resist the Emperor’s Will, but that they were swiftly crushed. Of them, no more is spoken and none know of their names, though several still-charred planets perhaps give some evidence of their fate. No world living now would ever admit to such unthinkable betrayal in its past, and all are content knowing that none from those planets still live.
The Rise of the Pandaemonium
The time of peace was brief, as soon civil war on a scale undreamt of erupted. Many tales speak of how the sector’s people fought valiantly during the dark times when the Imperium was nearly split asunder during the Great Heresy. Though much of the region faced horrific damage and many of its main worlds were reduced to ruin, Askellon, like the Imperium, survived.
Almost unnoticed amongst these early days of unification and rebellion were the first recordings of terrible Warp storms raging across the once-peaceful region. Twisted legends began that the storms were growing in appetite, and only abated after they had devoured sufficient ships or worlds to sate themselves temporarily. It was not until millennia later that Argo Kappellax, then Arch-Magos of Cerix Magnus, established they were not legion but instead a singular storm, rising and falling, though no aerythmatical formulae could fully predict its actions. The name the Navigator Houses of Askellon cursed it with ages ago, Pandaemonium, soon became commonplace amongst those who ply the Warp routes across the sector and beyond.
The Infernal Storm continues to ravage the sector to this day, with periods of relative calm only to be followed with times so tumultuous that interstellar travel and communication become nigh impossible. With each generation it appears to grow stronger, though most assume this is more a reflection of Askellon’s earlier, more golden ages than any true measurements. Some scholars believe that the Pandaemonium is once again growing in fury, this time to a level that reality itself might not withstand the storm surge.
The Time of Ending Approaches
In the ten millennia that have passed since the founding of Askellon, the sector’s fortunes have waxed and waned many times. It has risen to the heights of power and prestige, only to be hurled into the depths of the abyss by the secret hubris of its leaders. Juno, the sector’s pre-eminent world and the seat of its Sector Praefect, has been overrun by alien invasion, torn apart by bloodthirsty rebels, and crushed by wars with neighbouring powers. Askellon’s peoples have been enslaved, butchered, and bombarded from orbit. Each time the sector has rebuilt itself atop the ruins, though never so high nor so proud as before. In current eras, many look back at past ages as golden periods and can only see darker times ahead.
Xenos threats are certainly on the rise, from raiders attacking vessels across the sector to entire armies seeking to conquer Imperial worlds. The sector contains the remains of many long-dead alien civilisations, and even their ossified artefacts can cause irreparable harm in the wrong hands. There are tales of cults that dare worship the inhuman, befouling human souls with the taint of the alien. Worse still, there are rumours of the resurrection of races thought dead and forgotten, though only the gullible or fanatical give these credence.
The Pandaemonium has only added to the sense of doom. For several millennia, Navigators and Chartist Captains have considered the region, ever traitorous and poorly charted, as ill-aspected and in some manner cursed. Instances of vessels cast violently off course, barely surviving passage or vanishing entirely, are growing. Already, numerous charts state simply “Access Denied,” where before they listed the details of the cursed sector, a warning that some who enter it might never return. Though it is a period of seeming calm, it grows in rage and hunger, but for what none dare say. Its power is limited not only to Warp travel; entire planets have been engulfed or lost behind its storm front, becoming isolated for generations. Doomsayers cry that the storm is drawn towards those worlds with the greatest populations of Psykers, or worse might be itself causing the increasing number of these and other Mutants. Heretical texts claim it is a manifestation of ancient sins revisited on the living, or the spirit of betrayed souls screaming for vengeance, and is so deeply entrenched within the stones of the sector’s fortresses and the souls of its people that it may never be excised. Though none would openly countenance such beliefs, few Askellians disagree that it holds the sector in a vice that is ever closing.
The pervasive sense of coming doom has led many to turn away from their Emperor to other gods, and heresies grow across the sector. Wherever there is darkness they fester, from within the shadows of tall, gleaming spires or the foetid black of buried ruins, though many operate openly behind façades of the respectable or sanctioned. No world or system is safe from the touch of The Ruinous Powers, and no soul proof against its many temptations. Only through faith in the Emperor, and the actions of His servants, can the sector survive these apocalyptic times.