Outside of the Plague Planet, not much is said about the Death Guard mansion.
Even most within the Eye of Terror know very little, save for some vague rumors that are large and impressive.
In fact, few outside the confines of hell truly understand it.
To the people of the Empire, the name Mortarion meant nothing more than a reminder of the past.
And this is exactly what the Lord of Death wishes.
To understand this, one must first understand the character of the Primarch, a complex man even among his fallen brothers.
He cannot be described directly as angry, unlike people who can directly describe Angron, the King of Slaughter. At the same time, he does not have the desire for control like the Priest King Lorgar.
Mortarion carries more of his past than most of his brothers, and according to him, it all came too late and too hard to accept.
He was the last Primarch to succumb and convert to the Dark Gods, and the last to arrive on Terra to take part in the siege.
According to widely disputed rumors, he was also the last Primarch to evacuate Terra.
For Mortarion, more than anything else, there was contradiction, conflict, and opposition, and his heart was full of hatred-for his father, for what happened to him, for the Empire, and for himself.
The world in which he was fostered was so poisonous that even if the Emperor treated him differently, it would not erase the scars in his heart.
N'Galtar, the Deathstroke Herald, knew these things. This was no secret among the Legion, and it did not diminish N'Galtar's respect for his master in any way.
In his faith, “hurt” is not something to worry about—it should be celebrated, cultivated, and if possible, amplified.
They understand that attempts to stem the corruption will only bring about the greatest disappointment, and those of the Corpse Emperor's lackeys cannot understand that there is no need to shut it out. Learn to embrace it, learn to use it, or you'll be stuck in a long and tiring process of failure.
Still, Ngarta was anxious.
A long time has passed, and although the passage of time in the Eye of Terror is strange, if measured by the rotation of the Plague Planet, it must be at least several centuries.
The Legion has become accustomed to silence, accustomed to doing their own things.
Typhonse, that insufferable figurehead, became the figurehead of many of them during the empty years, although his many successes never offset the suspicion he inspired among the older generations.
"We know exactly what you did to us."
Ngarta thought as he walked.
"We won't forget."
He walked there with the ferryman Mawson, which took them a long time because the terrain was deliberately designed to be rough.
They wound their way along the steep shoulders of the steeple, sometimes, forced down, where the air was thick and the mutants drove scores of mortal slaves.
They strode past the rotting altar, squeezed through the squirming flies, saw the ever-turning mill wheels, and saw bones strewn on the wet ground beneath their feet.
After a long time the ground began to rise, the black soil glistening with moisture and dark leaves spreading around them.
Demons hissed at them from the warm shadows, a pool of stagnant water boiled uncomfortably, and huge monuments swayed by the roadside, badly worn by the caustic winds that blew incessantly.
Finally, they saw an extremely heavily defended castle.
The steep side walls of the fortress rise hundreds of meters high from the green-lit ravine, without handrails.
The place was like a mountain, its terrain rising far beyond all practical considerations to the point of hubris and madness.
Soaring spiral towers crowded each other, lanterns hung from the spiers, and stone steps wound around the sloping wings of the hall, sometimes leading to somewhere, sometimes ending in mass graves or smoke-filled areas.
Here is the decaying church of God, empty of people, rising from the ground like an abandoned tomb, and in the air mingled with incense and the sweet smell of the dead, the dying and the risen.
"You never quite get used to it...how huge it is."
The Deathstroke Herald looked up at the fortress and sighed.
"It is said that it is still getting bigger."
The ferryman echoed, not seeming too interested.
"Only God knows what happened."
This is the palace of the Lord of Death, full of petitioners, messengers, wizards and prophets. Countless mutants and demons crouch on the battlements that stretch for several kilometers.
Pilgrims filed toward the lock, so numerous that they filled the causeway across half the continent.
The priests of the corrupted god preached to them endlessly, their shrill cries punctuated by the tolling of broken bells.
The Pilgrims peered out from their battered hoods, hungry eyes waiting for one of their brothers to fall so they could chew a little gristle that night.
Above them floated spaceships and gunboats, leaving wisps of smoke in the blazing aurora night sky.
Beyond that there was only the sound of the floating shroud, as eerie as that of a whale, shimmering like a mysterious midnight ghost.
N'Galta didn't need to emphasize his presence here, and as he and the ferryman walked toward the gate, the crowd spontaneously backed away, making the sign of three on their chests, even the demons with their infected whips He also stopped and stared at the Deathstroke Herald.
The blind haulers shuddered to a stop, the vans filled with mushy fruit rocking on greasy axles, and the mutants stared at them with big shining eyes, panting and spitting out strings from their fanged mouths. Strings of saliva.
"Is it always this big?"
Ngarta asked, looking at the crowd with interest.
"Yes."
The ferryman said as he walked slowly to the gate.
"I never knew exactly why they came."
"Same reasons as we do."
Ngarta sent a signal to the distant guards, and the iron shaft began to spin.
"But only we can get in."
The gate, like everything here, is a parody.
They are said to be only seven centimeters taller than the Eternal Gate on Terra.
Mortarion did a lot of similar things - basically trivial things, as a mockery of fate, like the turrets being slightly higher than the Imperial Senate and the walls being steepened by seven degrees.
Still, the effect is impressive.
The fake door was held by a group of mutants with chains, and it took ten minutes to open it.
Only then does the mansion's gloomy interior become apparent.
A pile of crumbling, half-ruined rotten stones, piled together in a haphazard manner, getting higher and higher, interconnected and intertwined, forming a fragile, bloated city, like a nest of thorns stuck high in the clouds .
There was a mist around its foundations, boiling over the black surface and staining the rocks.
The great demon roared from the arcane prison buried deep in the magic tower, shaking the wet earth all the way to the center of the world.
