| “ | And what are the achievements of your fragile Imperium? It is a corpse rotting slowly from within while maggots writhe in its belly. It was built with the toil of heroes and giants, and now it is inhabited by frightened weaklings to whom the glories of those times are half-forgotten legends. I have forgotten nothing, and my wisdom has expanded far beyond mere mortal frailties. | „ |
| ~ Ahriman of the Thousand Sons. |
Ahzek Ahriman, also known as Sorcerer of the Red Cyclops and Ahriman of the Thousand Sons, is an exceptionally powerful Chaos Space Marine sorcerer belonging to the Thousand Sons legion. He roams the galaxy commanding a warband, raiding and plundering bastions of information.
Born on Terra and recruited into the Thousand Sons, Ahriman rose through the ranks of his legion to become their Chief Librarian/psyker and preeminent master of one of their psychic disciplines: precognition. Surviving the various battles of the Great Crusade, Ahriman found himself at the centre of the events that would lead to the fall of the Thousand Sons and their collective descent into the clutches of Tzeentch, Chaos God of sorcery and change, during the Horus Heresy. His actions after the Heresy - particularly creating and enacting the great spell that bears his name, the Rubric of Ahriman - would result in his eventual banishment from the Legion he had spent most of his existence trying to safeguard. His current status is that of wanderer, apparently fated to quest for something never achievable; understanding of the nature of Tzeentch itself.
Despite the nature of his doom, Ahriman has embraced his quest totally, and no bastion of knowledge in the entire galaxy can be considered safe from his rapacious intellect.
History[]
Ahzek Ahriman was born on Terra, among the wealthy tribes of the Achaemenid Empire whose kings had allied with the Emperor during the Unification Wars. Because of this alliance, Ahriman's tribes were largely spared the horrors of the atomic wars and proto-Astartes invasions of the Unification period. Following the Emperor's victory and Terra's alliance with Mars, Ahriman and his twin brother Ohrmuzd were selected to be inducted into the ranks of the Astartes. Ahriman fought alongside the Emperor and the other legions at the start of the Great Crusade, but five years into the expedition the Thousand Sons legion began manifesting psychic abilities, and with the manifestations began the flesh-changes. Terrible and warping mutations gripped the entire legion, countless warriors succumbed and fell to the changes. Over time the problem got so severe that many voices throughout the Imperium even began suggesting that the legion be disbanded. Ahriman even lost his own twin brother Ohrmuzd to the effects. Eventually the crusade reached Prospero, and the discovery of Magnus couldn't come soon enough. The discovery of their sire marked a turning point in the fortunes of the Thousand Sons legion, Magnus was able to seemingly cure the warping effects and the devastation they had upon his legion. Magnus however sacrificed much in order to achieve this, he lost his eye in the effort, which was implied to have involved bargains with Chaos Powers.
Before the events of the Horus Heresy, Ahriman, risen to the positions of Chief Librarian of the legion and leader of it's most powerful cult, the Corvidae, had shared his Primarch's obsession with arcane mysteries and by the beginning of the Heresy had come to be keeper of the now mythical Book of Magnus, a tome of incalculable sorcerous power.
It may have been knowledge gleaned from that very tome with which Ahriman conjured his now infamous master spell. The result of the so called 'Rubric of Ahriman', while imperfect, is said to have satisfied Ahriman in its consequence. In essence, it turned all the warriors without psychic abilities into mindless automata, and greatly amplified the abilities of all who had more then a spark. Ahriman was a veteran Thousand Son from before the coming of Magnus the Red, and Ahriman's revulsion at the corruption of the Legion was so great that even the terrible price of reversing it was not too high. Ahriman attempted the spell at first, alone. He was unsuccessful, and later it required a large Cabal of Sorcerers to assist him, who were only motivated to do so upon Magnus' elevation to Daemon Prince. The last vestiges of humanity were purged from the Thousand Sons, and few desired the resulting spawndom.
Magnus was not of like mind, however. So great was his wrath when the cabal was discovered that the Primarch threatened to obliterate them utterly, but the very patron who had worked the mutations upon them in the first place was said to have intervened. Who can say what the most enigmatic and capricious of entities intended? In any event, the Daemon Prince stayed his hand, instead banishing Ahriman from the Planet of Sorcerers and condemning him to wander the Eye of Terror and beyond in a hopeless quest to understand the Chaos god Tzeentch.
For his part, Ahriman refuses to acknowledge Chaos as his master. Across the ensuing millennia he has become a scourge, raiding ancient museums, librarium, scholaria and reclusia, places of learning, religion and contemplative thought. He seeks to acquire artifacts, data, or even persons he believes can lead him to mastery over the way of the sorcerer. He fosters cults on dozens of worlds at a time, providing cult magi with sorcerous power until such time as they have acquired some antiquarian trinket or satisfied another of Ahriman demands before turning the wrath of his warband upon them. It is rumoured that Ahriman has of late turned his relentless predation upon the Eldar, determined in his belief that the lost knowledge he seeks can be found in that darkest of halls of enlightenment, the vast repository of arcana referred to in whispers as the Black Library of Chaos.
Current Whereabouts and Dealings[]
A battle-ready Ahriman
During Abaddon's 13th Black Crusade Ahriman was able to gain access to the Webway using the captured Inquisitor Czevak and a long forgotten webway portal on Etiamnum III. It is rumoured that if he obtains entry into the Black Library, he could use the information inside to become a new and powerful Chaos God.
Despite summoning a 'Leviathan', a gigantic flying warp beast and Ahriman bringing horrendous casualties on both sides of the conflict; Ahriman was ejected from the Webway his goal unattained, Inquisitor Czevak captured by harlequins and believed held in the webway, the webway Gate he used was sealed, never to be opened again. The final results of the Campaign state that his 'star is on the rise' with Magnus once again, mostly due to the great chaos caused by his battles in the Webway, prowness in capturing Inquistor Czevak, and ability to come close to entering the Black Library.
Powers and Abilities[]
Ahriman is a true master of sorcery and is considered to be among the most powerful psykers in the galaxy that is not head-to the wall insane, his knowledge of the dark arts is rivalled only by the greater daemons of his patron. He has near-unparalled mastery over a vast array of disciplines, both basic and advanced. He is also very skilled in summoning daemons and other warp creatures. In addition to the vast multitude of Chaotic Psychic Powers he can call upon, he is armed with The Black Staff of Ahriman; an ornate Force weapon capable of sundering reality which also provides a potent focus for his psychic energy. He also carries an enchanted bolt pistol which fires powerful Inferno bolts similar to the weapons of his Rubric Marines that is capable of penetrating power armor. Ahzek is such a powerful psyker that he is considered to be a literal rift in reality.
Ahriman's sorcerous powers are apparent even in the cast of his skin; his facial features seem to blur and shift constantly, making it almost impossible to focus on anything other than his eyes, which appear as constantly burning with a blue flame. Mysteriously he also became significantly larger than he was during the Horus Heresy.
Powers[]
- Superhuman Physiology: Being a genetically-engineered superhuman, Ahriman is superior in every way to a baseline human. He is vastly stronger and faster and has the capability to live for thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years, practically being near-immortal. He is considered exceptionally intelligent, even among his fellow sorcerers. He also possesses limited regeneration and has natural night-vision like all space marines.
- Superhuman Strength: Like all space marines Ahriman is able to lift several tons of weight (4-5 tons is a reasonable estimate), crush heads, casually rip off ork limbs, break apart tank turrets, crush metal pipes, punch through thick tree branches unarmored etc.
- Superhuman Speed: Ahriman possesses enhanced speed, reflexes and senses. He is able to run so fast that the normal human eye can barely keep up with him and he is even capable of dodging bullets. He can realistically react in the span of microseconds at the least, at most possibly nanoseconds.
- Superhuman Stamina: Ahriman can keep on fighting for an exceedingly long time and requires only the most minimal of rest. In one source a small group of space marines were on active combat duty for 364 days without ever tiring, It's not infeasible to think that Ahriman can do the same especially considering he's among the most exceptional of chaos space marines.
- Limited Invulnerability: With his vastly powerful powers he is able to phase himself in and out of the warp, temporarily avoiding all damage, though he may still be somewhat vulnerable to some psychic-based attacks.
- Near-Immortality: Ahriman is able to live for an exceptionally long time, so long in fact that a space marine could be considered near-immortal. But if any considerable damage is done to his organs, his lifespan could be severly reduced, though with him having access to biomancy he could very well nullify such a problem.
- Telepathy: Ahriman is able to easily read, attack and invade the minds of others. In one moment he was able to read hundreds of thousands of minds simultaneously without showing any real constraint and at another point managed to telepathically overpower 36 Sorcerers at once, single-handedly. In addition he is capable of disintegrating tons worth of steel machinery thrown at him with his mind alone. Safe to say, Ahriman is a master of telepathy.
- Telekinesis: With telekinesis Ahriman can move stuff with his mind, erect force fields, create portals and even rend the fabric of reality itself apart. It also allows him to manipulate technological devices, such as jamming weapons and the engines of vehicles and walkers. He can create a large tear between the material realm and the warp, unleashing energies so rampant it will consume any nearby foe and otherwise severly damaging those who are too gigantic to be swallowed E.G Titans.
- Transmutation: Tzeentch's unique psychic discipline gives Ahriman the ability of transmutation. Most notably he can hurl bolts of rolling energy, formed of the raw stuff of the warp, which causes rapid mutation, also melting flesh and vaporizing metal. He is able to mutate his allies by laying his hands on them and conjure a storm of pink and blue fire that mutates his foes into mindless flesh abominations known as chaos spawn.
- Mind Control: Ahriman is capable of controlling the actions, thoughts and speech of other's. Such is the power of his mind that Ahriman, even in his early weaker days was capable of possessing the minds of hundreds of marines by simply saying their names, even forcing one of them to relentlessly insult another marine.
- Precognition: Ahriman can accurately predict future events and enemy movement. In one moment he was able to see an entire battle before it even happened and in another moment managed to miracously save his own ship from blowing up knowing the name of the ship that did it before it occurs. With his extreme talent with precognition he is even able to see into the future to guide his inferno bolts for top-notch accuracy and can scan the entirety of a large spacecraft in an instant. This power has saved Ahriman and many others countless times.
- Replication: Ahriman has the ability to create copies of himself, all of them capable of wielding his vast array of powers! At one point when he fought against Harlequins (essentially super-fast psycho elf clowns) he created a room full of copies that helped to turn the tide. This is not an ability that he seems to use that often, but it's still impressive nonetheless.
- Biomancy: Ahriman has the ability to manipulate biological energy and processes. He can heal himself from the brink of death at a molecular level, control an opponents nervous system and drain the life-force of other's. This psychic discipline also allows him to literally force choke enemies (vader style), conjure waves of bio lightning from his fingertips, and remove any poisons and toxins from one's body.
- Pyrokinesis: Ahriman can manipulate and create fire with his mind. He is able to throw powerful bolts of warpfire from the palm of his hands, transform himself into a figure of pure flame that is able to set ablaze the souls of anyone nearby, create towering walls of protective flame, spontaneously combust enemies and even spit out torrents of psychic flame that pours from his mouth and eyes.
- Geomortis/Earthbending: Ahriman has the ability to manipulate the very earth itself. He is able to open up great chasms and holes under his enemies feet sending them plunging to their deaths, force lava and hot steam to erupt from the ground, cause fortress walls to crumble and collapse, and even changing the very landscape itself to shapes more pleasing to him.
- Soul Manipulation: Ahriman has the ability to manipulate and possess the souls of other's. In one particular moment he was able to suck out the soul of a powerful space marine psyker and fed it to daemons.
- Daemonology: Ahriman is among the few sorcerers that has fully mastered the use of daemonology, the ability to manipulate the interactions between warpspace and the mortal world/real-space. He is able to banish daemons, strip the powers of psykers, phase through solid matter, Teleport himself and others, create swirling vortexes that sucks anything nearby into the warp and imbue himself with the energy of the warp for vastly increased strength and agility.
- Daemonancy: Ahriman has mastered the sorcerous art of summoning daemons into real-space. In one case he successfully summoned a giant flying warp beast known as a "Leviathan", gargantuan warp creatures bigger than any battleship wreathed in flame and followed by vast swarms of space-faring daemons such as sceamers. Though they can only stay in the materium for a temporary time, they always leave behind damage on an enormous scale.
- Flight: In some instances Ahriman might mount himself on top of a Disc of Tzeentch for greatly increased mobility and flight. A Disc of Tzeentch is a flying daemonic steed that are tied to the will of their master, combining great mobility with calculated thinking. Some surge forward by bending the dimensions of real-space, whereas others emit jets of warpflame from maws on their underside.
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