Pony Imperium

>The human xenocide was supposed to be a footnote in the history of the Great Crusade
>and it would have been, if not for the terrible events that followed such an otherwise irrelevant war
>It was one of the last campaigns fought by the 16th legion Luna’s Wolves before darker forces took control of their once noble Primarch and of the entire legion
>In the early days of M31, humanity was one of the many races that dared oppose ponykind’s right to rule the stars. Their technology was surprisingly advanced for such a young race and already established several colonies in the systems surrounding their home planet
>They were already starting to expand their territory at a surprisingly high speed with twenty worlds already under their belt after only a century of discovering the warp drive. They could have become a thorn on Imperium’s side
>While humans were still inferior to the Imperium in terms of numbers and technology, they were aware of their inferiority and had resorted to turning even the most insignificant colony into a fortress that could resist against Imperial forces for months or even years
>when casualties started to reach worrying numbers, High Command requested the presence of Astartes forces. The Luna’s Wolves replied to the call as soon as they could and Luna herself decided to join the fight.
>They were not the only ones to reply to the request. A Grand Battalion of Iron Warriors, under the authority of Warsmith Maud Pie, had been even faster than them and had been the first Astartes forces deployed on the sector

>The first great battle of this war that involved the Luna’s Wolves and the Iron Warriors directly was the siege of Terra Nova.
>The humans had evacuated the civilian population back to their polluted homeworld and turned the planet’s main city into an almost impregnable fortress.
>At least a hundred thousand human soldiers were barricaded behind several lines of minefields, trenches, and concrete bunkers protected by a complex network of shields. They had enough ammo and supplies to resist for years, probably even for decades.
>while the possibility of glassing the planet was considered, but the idea was discarded because the planet was supposed to be inhabitable after being conquered
>A planetary assault was the only option left, and the Iron Warriors claimed the honor of dictating the strategy to use
>In a matter of hours, they surrounded the city and send waves after waves of penal battalions to clear out the first layer of minefields and to waste the enemy’s artillery.
>After ten waves, the last penal battalion sent to attack was completely wiped out and the real assault on the human lines began as the Iron Warriors emerged from their positions. Limestone Pie herself led the charge.
>The attack, while technically successful, was completely lacking in imagination. The Astartes attacked the enemy with overwhelming force and relied on their mechanized elements to carry the battle while the infantry protected the vehicles.
>The first three lines of fortifications had been broken, but this achievement had come at the cost of a hundred Astartes and thousands of regular soldiers. A high price for any other legion, especially for such a small gain, but the Iron Warriors were used to heavy casualties.
>The Luna’s Wolves arrived shortly after this assault and immediately opted for a very different strategy, one that wouldn’t risk so many lives for modest results

>at first, the standard strategy of the orbital bombardment was tried, but it achieved almost no result with the exception of giving a Luna a vital piece of information.
>No shield, no matter how powerful its generator, can last forever, and the ones defending the human fortress were prepared to expand outward if one of the others failed or needed repairs. That expansion would take several minutes before it could fully cover the gap.
>this was usually not a problem for the humans since the fortifications were tough enough to endure more than a couple of hits.
>This, however, was also the perfect opening she needed to win the battle in one fell swoop.
>one night, all guns focused on one sector of the fortress, disabling all the shields protecting it. As soon as the last shield fell, several thunderhawks rushed into the gap and, even if some were shot down, managed to deliver multiple teams of assault marines right into the heart of the fortress.
>the assault teams were carrying with them many teleportation homers that allowed at least fifty marines equipped with terminator armor to join the battle immediately alongside Luna herself.
>what followed could only be described as a one-sided massacre as the shields were manually disabled forever alongside the anti-air guns and the entire Luna’s Wolves force entered the fortress.
>The only few humans who made it out of the fortress were swiftly cut down by the Iron Warriors who were trying to claim some of the glory they felt was rightfully theirs and the Luna’s Wolves were shamelessly stealing
>The Iron Warriors were not grateful to the Luna Wolves, especially once the latter were acclaimed as the sole victors of the siege of Terra Nova. In typical Iron Warrior fashion, this event became one of the many grudges held by the bitter daughters of Limestone Pie

>the rest of the campaign followed a similar pattern, with the Iron Warriors enduring heavy casualties only to be robbed of their eventual victory by the more adaptable Luna’s Wolves
>On Elysium, the Iron Warriors took city after city slowly and methodically while the Luna’s Wolves went straight for the local capital and decapitated the human leadership on the planet. When the planet was taken, the Luna’s Wolves were credited with the victory despite having suffered a lot less casualties than the Iron Warriors
>The siege of Eden Prime was a similar story. The Iron Warriors were, at first, the only Astartes forces on the planet and hoped that, at least one time, they could be the one credited with a victory
>The siege lasted several months and costed more Iron Warriors than the rest of the campaign until that point combined. Despite this, Maud Pie was close to achieving a victory without the intervention of the Luna’s Wolves, but all her hopes were dashed when Luna herself showed up with several hundred legionaries to participate in the final assault
>The events that transpired inside the fortress of Eden Prime are a mystery, but both legions claimed to have been attacked by the other. The fact that only the Luna’s Wolves were seen emerging from the fortress, sending Maud Pie into a cold and bitter rage that she then bottled up like a true Iron Warrior, was something that could not be disputed.
>The rivalry between the legions only increased during the entirety of the campaign. It is surprising that both of them would fight on the same side when the darkest day dawned.
>The predictable conclusion of the human campaign would happen on their homeworld, known as Earth. The planet had been turned into a fortress that would make all the previous sieges look like childish pranks with water balloons.
>that should have been the moment were the Iron Warriors could finally shine as the masters of siege warfare that they were

>The final planetary assault began with a massive bombardment that turned many of the most populous human cities into piles of rubble while keeping the regions with valuable resources mostly intact and colonizable
>The first bridgehead was established in the southern region of the continent the humans had called Africa. The entire landmass was filled with useful resources and they would have to be seized as soon as possible to starve the human war machine.
>The city of Cape Town resisted for over two months and was taken only after the arrival of a large amount of reinforcements for the Iron Warriors and the Imperial Army, who still suffered high casualties before the intervention of the Luna’s Wolves, who had been busy finishing off what was left of the human fleet.
>In another two months, the most valuable continent had been taken. It is unclear why a vital region such as Africa had not been looked after a little bit better by humanity.
>After taking Africa, the two legions picked different targets. The Luna’s Wolves would take the wealthy cities of Europe, while the Iron Warriors would have to fight through the vast and almost endless lands of Asia.
>Before the Iron Warriors could take control of India, the Luna’s Wolves were already preparing to land North America.
>All the major cities, even the ones that been bombed before, were it at the same moment by several waves of drop pods. Luna decided to finally join the battle, and she picked the ruins of New York as her landing spot.
>Despite having suffered the worst of the bombing, the city was still crawling with human snipers that had to be eliminated one by one before Imperial forces could finally move out.
>The chaos that had seemingly paralyzed the local human military only ended up helping Luna, who didn’t have to deal with any counter-attacks from the outside as she took full control of the city

>In less than a month, and just as the Iron Warriors reached the borders of China, the Luna’s Wolves had seized New York and sallied out of the city to fight all the way to the Appalachian Mountains while reconnecting with the various forces that had taken the other major cities in North America.
> the Appalachian mountains soon became the line of defense for the humans in North America, especially once the East Coast ended up getting encircled and butchered.
>Since Imperial forces had proven themselves more than capable of taking even their best fortresses, the humans opted for a strategy of guerrilla that relied on completely abandoning the towns in the region and setting up bases in the middle of nowhere
>that strategy ended up earning the humans another year of fighting as all the small bases had to be located with advanced scanners and destroyed on by one. In the end, Luna opted for burning the entire region to the ground to starve the enemy to death. Since the humans would not fight with honor, neither would she
>In retrospect, that decision was a sign of the darkness growing inside the entirety of the Luna’s Wolves legion, including the Primarch herself. Since it was a strategically valid move, however, no one questioned it
>once the entire region had stopped burning, the Luna’s Wolves remained there for another two months to make sure that no humans could get of out it.
>Once she was sure all the humans had starved to death, Luna moved her legion to South America where she pre-emptively burned large sections of the Amazon forest just to make sure she wouldn’t have to deal with any guerrilla movement.
>In the end, the South American campaign was terminated relatively quickly, with the only major sieges happening at Rio de Janeiro and at Brasilia. Both of the last about two months and only took so long only because of the size of the cities.

>After the fall of South America, which coincided with the conquest of Shanghai by the Iron Warriors, any form of meaningful resistance by the humans had ceased to exist. The remaining three months were spent wiping out what was left of humanity in places Japan or Australia
>The campaign still had one insult to deliver to Iron Warriors, who were sure the Empress would be recognized as the ones who did the most to defeat the human race. They were sure they would finally share some glory
>When the Empress, right in the middle of the victory celebration, had hailed only the Luna’s Wolves as the ones who did the most to win the only war fought against humanity, the Iron Warriors stood up and left
>it was the first time Space Marines turned their back on the Empress, and it would not be the last.