[Lord of the Night]

Can't wait!! Its been too long since we last saw Curze, i'm dying to see how he escapes Imperium Secundus and goes on to turn the Eastern Fringe into a nightmare.


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[Lord of the Night]

He was a major character in Pharos

He had one scene. That does not make a major character.

Curze hasn't properly appeared in a novel since Unremembered Empire, so i'm really looking forward to seeing him back in action.


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[Lord of the Night]

Finished it over the weekend. Not the best in the series, but not the worst either.

It looks like the Imperium Secundus ark is finished at last, and we see what's happening on Caliban with Luther, Astelan and Zahariel. It turns out the whole planet of Caliban is actually a prison for a demonic creature, which would explain all the creatures that infested it until the Lion cleaned it up.

I quite enjoyed the book, it didn't crack the Top 10 for me but i'd say it's in the Top 20. For me the highlights were: (Warning, HUGE HUGE spoilers below. Like MEGA-HUGE.)

-The Dreadwing. Damn those guys were scary. Anti-grav Land Raiders, Warp Rift Cannons, Phosphex grenade launchers, chemical warheads, Incendine combusters, and that chant. That gave me chills. Farith Redloss proved to be a dick, but the concept behind the Hexagrammaton, the Wings of the Angels of Death, was awesome.

-Guilliman defending the Illyrians is just another reason why he's the most awesome of the Loyalist Primarchs. He would have broken the Triumverate to protect the people who murdered his father and tried to kill him, because they are still human and need a protector.

-Zahariel becoming Cypher. My theory ever since Pandorax is that the Horus Heresy Cypher was meant to be the 40k Cypher but somebody "switched" with him, meaning that whoever Cypher is in 40k, he was actually meant to be Epimetheus and meet the sad fate that the GK Lord met. So if Epimetheus is the Cypher of the HH, then Zahariel (now Chaos tainted) is The Lord of Fallen Angels. (Speculation)

-The Trial of Konrad Curze. For a homicidal, cannibalistic, nihilistic madman, Curze is actually a pretty good public speaker. Imperium Secundus fell not to armies, corruption, subterfuge or treachery, but just the truth spoken from a monster who was completely right. Also brilliant that Guilliman fought to give Curze a trial, more proof that Guilliman will always do what is right even if it isn't convenient, and brilliant that Curze insisted on defending himself.

Also loved it when: (Spoilers again, but not as HUGE as before.)

Astelan hinted at the Unification Wars and the reasons the Emperor needed to shield each and every Astartes in the Legion, the psyker warlords and abominations that might have subverted them. The adventure of conquering Terra, the Emperor on the frontlines of the conflict, the nightmare kingdoms of the Terran Warlords.

We really need to get a Unification Wars series in the future.

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[Lord of the Night]

I thought most of Terra already was conquered by the time of the first founding. The Thunder Warriors already having done the brunt of the fighting to conquer most of Terra. Only hold out kingdoms, such as what the nascent Salamanders faced being some of the exceptions.

That's the official record. Unofficially it seems the First Legion existed a lot longer before the others than we were led to believe. Long enough that they played a real role in the Unification Wars. The Thunder Warriors did the bulk of the fighting it appears, but the Astartes were there too.


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