Luis Dante

Name: Luis Dante

age: +1100 years

legion: blood angels

rank within his legion: Chapter Master (commander of the entire legion)

Current position: Regent of the Imperium Nihilus (literally the second highest authority in the human empire, ruling the other half of an empire that spans a large part of the galaxy)

Primarch Served: Sanguinius

planet of origin: Baal Secundus

The warrior who would become Dante began life like any other Blood Angel. He was born a mortal named Luis to a father named Arreas and a mother of unknown name in 447.M40 on Baal Secundus. Luis endured and grew into his teenage years wandering the Great Salt Waste, far beyond any settlement on Baal Secundus. In 456.M40, Luis lost his mother. Emboldened by the loss, he abandoned his father to undertake the perilous journey of becoming an Angel. Due to his life wandering the salt deserts, Luis' growth was stunted even by the standards of the place. His skin shared the same disfigurement that all Baalites bore due to exposure to the radioactive deserts of their homeworld. The Great Salt Waste, which Luis called home, was a long way from Angelfall. No Salt Wanderer who had attempted the journey had survived to tell the tale. However, the boy showed his determination and tried. Unfortunately, like so many before him, Luis failed when thirst strangled him and deprived him of reason. When all hope seemed lost, the boy saw a winged, golden figure, and with it, precious water. This was the first of four encounters with what Luis would come to know as the Sanguinor.

It is said that Luis did not display any special abilities among the candidates who made it to the place of choice. It was sheer luck that allowed him and the other 500 boys to make the first cut. However, it was Luis' determination, not chance, that earned him the approval of his peers in later trials. Throughout the trials, Luis did not stand out: he was neither the most athletic nor the strongest, but he survived and was taken to the Chapel of Defiance. It was there that the boy faced his first real test: the Trial of War. With a clear mind and self-confidence, Luis led his force to victory. However, the senseless bloodshed and deaths of the other aspirants disgusted him. This disgust would serve him well in his final trial: the Trial of Horus. Resolutely adhering to his morals, Luis refused to kill a fellow student, thus sealing his fate as a Blood Angel. He and the other victorious challengers were then transported to the Blood Angels' fortress-monastery on Baal. It was there that he faced his final challenge: the Breath of Weariness. For three days Louis lay awake, and on the last day, as sleep threatened to overtake him, he received aid once more from the mysterious Sanguinor and passed his final test. In the Chapter's great cathedral, beneath the glowering marble gazes of the Blood Angels who had been the Chapter's champions, Louis received the Sanguinary Chalice and drank the blood of Sanguinius. Instantly, Louis fell into the year-long ritual sleep required for the gene-seed implantation process and was entombed within a hallowed sarcophagus.

It was during this time that he came to the attention of the Sanguinary Priests. While all aspirants dreamed visions of Sanguinius' life and death, Louis cried out the names of fallen primarchs, dark gods and banished daemons endlessly for that year, drifting between consciousness and slumber but yielding to neither state. So violent was his sleep that it is said to have lifted the lid of his sarcophagus. Many aspirants die in their sarcophagi; such is the way of things for those who would become Blood Angels. The weak always failed, even at the first step. But no aspirant had ever shown such torment and survived. As he emerged, free of the flaws of Baal Secundus and with an angelic body, none of the Sanguinary Priests missed the detail of the marks left by his hand on the inside of the lid of his coffin. Yet here he stood before them, a being who was no longer Luis. Dante was perfect, ready to begin his true training. Some among the Sanguinary Priesthood believed this to be the first omen of a swift descent into the maddening depths of the Red Thirst and the Black Rage. Others argued that Dante's perfection after so much suffering heralded an age of greatness. By 753.M40 Dante had attained the rank of Captain.

It was during the Kallius Uprising that the Blood Angels once again tasted the sweetness of annihilation, losing nine out of ten Space Marines and almost the entire Chapter Council. Three full companies, including the young Captain Dante and his 8th Assault Company, launched a devastating assault on Kallius's Landing and its dependent worlds in support of their overwhelmed successor brothers, the Angels Numinous (better known, due to their symbol, as the 'Blood Eagles'). World after world had risen in rebellion, spreading insurrections across the region and then the sub-sector. Entire populations and shoddy fleets were led into battle under the command and chants of Traitor Marines, clad in a panoply of colours and drawn from countless warbands. The Blood Angels found themselves caught in protracted conflicts and trench warfare, caught in the web of a much wider heresy.

As weeks turned to months and months to years, more and more Chapter forces arrived to punish, cleanse and reclaim the rebel worlds. The Scrolls of Honour ran black with the ink of millions of slain enemies, but the Blood Angels began to suffer unbearable losses. Upon hearing of the arrival of dozens of Imperial Guard regiments alongside several Chapters, the Blood Angels withdrew from the conflict with their heads held high.

The greatest blow was yet to come, however: as the remnants of his fleet gathered over Kallius' Landing itself, a chaotic armada emerged from the warp, fuelled by the possibility of wiping the Blood Angels from the face of the Imperium. The space battle raged on for three full days, filled with vicious boarding actions, during which Dante and his warriors were responsible for the capture and destruction of seven capital ships. When the Blood Angels were finally victorious and assessed their losses, the result was that fewer than two hundred brothers remained. The surviving Sanguinary Priests and Chaplains met in council, electing the last living captain as the next Chapter Master. Dante accepted the mantle of Lord of the Angelic Host while still wearing his torn and blood-stained power armour. It would be the last day he would wear red, for from then on he would wear gold. Such a choice should have heralded a dark era, but fate would tell a very different story.

Since assuming the role of Chapter Master, Dante has led the Blood Angels to their most glorious and triumphant millennia since the time of the Purge. Perhaps the Great Wolf, Logan Grimnar of the Space Wolves, is beloved by the people of the Imperium above any other Space Marine commander, and Marneus Calgar of the Ultramarines is held in the highest regard by many Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. But where the Great Wolf is hailed by the people for both his wisdom and his fighting prowess, Dante is a gilded, aloof saviour, a hero of myth brought back to life. Where the Lord Defender of Macragge is a steadfast and ruthlessly efficient front-line general, admired for both his insight and his skill, Dante is an avenging angel, dropped from the heavens ahead of his brothers to strike the first blow. No loyal soul would ever compare these heroes, for all are equal in the eyes of the God-Emperor, but over 1,500 years of supreme service speak for themselves.

Dante’s exploits are already stained with the patina of myth. Every fall of his axe ends the reign of a daemonic lord. Every descent from the heavens, flying on wings of fire, means the end of another rebellion. Most of it may be myth, but much more of it is truth. Skarbrand, the Exiled Son of Khorne fell to Dante at the Gates of Pandemonium. With the daemon’s banishment, the creature’s armies soon lost their grip on reality and were cast back into the stench of the Warp. The planet Terion, in the dawn of M41, saw Dante lead his angels against an unholy alliance of the Night Lords and the warband known in Imperial records as the Brotherhood of Darkness. Centuries later, Terion had been rebuilt into a paradise, a place of rest and a place of rest. All that remained of the war's legacy was a monument to Dante, sculpted in marble and as tall as a colossus in the capital city, his hand extended toward the horizon, offering mercy to the citizens' ancestors.

None can deny the extent of Dante’s combat experience. He has fought countless battles, orchestrated countless campaigns and achieved bloody victories on worlds as far-flung as Ultima Macharia and the star-crossed Jonol, the homeworld of the Honoured Sons. Particularly decisive was his role in the Second War for Armageddon. Dante and his Blood Angels led reinforcements of Space Marines to Hive Acheron, where they drove off the attacking Orks and captured the heretic Governor Herman von Strab. Without the Blood Angels’ reinforcements, the Hive might have fallen to the Orks, and with it, the Imperium’s remaining chances of victory and its control over this strategically vital planet.

By the time the Third War for Armageddon began, Dante was too far away to fulfil his earlier oath to defend the planet from any further Ork attempts to take it over. Instead, he sent Captain Erasmus Tycho and his 3rd Company to lead the defence of the planet. He is said to have cut off countless Ork heads at the Liberation of Canau and it is also suspected that, many centuries ago, he was the Sergeant in charge of the 12 Space Marines who were tasked with the impossible mission of assaulting the Battle Barge Dreadclaw, a Night Lords vessel, and ending the life of the Night Lords' Chaos Lord as punishment for his endless transgressions. The enemy outnumbered them by several hundred, but the Sanguinor appeared to bless the then Sergeant and then dispatched a large portion of the Night Lords, making the mission a success.

Dante has held the Blood Angels together through the tempestuous years of a civil war unseen by the Imperium, and has set entire fleets of traitor ships ablaze with the wrath of his fleet's cannons. He has single-handedly taken the helmets of hundreds of Chaos champions as trophies, keeping such tainted relics in stasis when they cannot be destroyed, so that none more may rise as heirs to the fallen.

To his peers, Dante is an example of bravery, dedication and strategic genius that speaks to the heart of the Space Marines’ never-ending mission. To the generals and marshals of the Imperial Guard, he is a welcome and thrice-honoured ally who stands at the forefront of Mankind’s defence. To the soldiers and ordinary citizens of the Imperium, Dante is nothing less than a saviour.

Dante never expected to see the final days of his Chapter, though he faced them unflinchingly, as he never expected to see the return of a Primarch, but he knelt before Roboute Guilliman with a grateful heart. So when Guilliman named him Regent of the Imperium Nihilus, the Lord of Baal felt the hand of fate land heavily on his shoulder. With the fury of the Great Rift unleashed - a darkness more terrible than any in history stalking the Imperium - the Blood Angels now stand against that darkness with the Golden Throne of Terra at their backs, and they will have to fight as they have never done before.

With this reinvigorated new purpose, and the new hope that the Primaris Space Marines offer, there is a chance that the sons of Sanguinius will not go out like a fading candle. It is said among the Blood Angels that Commander Dante has never been greater, even in the face of such terrible adversity. The Regent of the Nihilus Imperium has sworn to purge the taint of Chaos from his dark new realm, even if it takes a thousand more years. After all, it is in the darkest night that these golden angels shine brightest.

Commander Dante is said to be exhausted from centuries of witnessing constant war and death, with only one goal left to fulfil. Sanguinius predicted before his death at the hands of Horus that a "Golden Warrior" would rise between the Emperor of Mankind and his destruction. Many Imperial scholars have assumed that this prophecy referred to Sanguinius himself, who faced Horus aboard his flagship, the Battle-Barge Vengeful Spirit, during the Battle of Terra.

However, Dante suspects his true meaning lies elsewhere, and believes that one day he could be all that stands between the now helpless Emperor, entombed within the Golden Throne, and those who wish to destroy him. Commander Dante wishes to survive long enough until he can fulfill his final duty.

He has the appearance of a man with a muscular and stocky build, although somewhat worn down by effort and battles. His aged face resembles that of an older man, between 50 and 60 years old, but quite well preserved. With long jet-black hair with some silver threads, pale skin and faint blue veins under the skin.

Dante and his legion have the "red tear" which is a huge red and gold spaceship 20 kilometers long similar to a warship and a spaceship, it is capable of destroying large enemy fleets on its own without problems.

As befits the Master of such an august Space Marine Chapter, Commander Dante carries ancient and powerful relics into battle. These superbly crafted artefacts bear witness to the history of the Blood Angels, while also making Dante even more deadly in combat.

Dante has never removed his golden mask outside the Fortress-Monastery of the Blood Angels, so his true physical appearance is unknown to outsiders. That golden faceplate is the Death Mask of Sanguinius, still pulsing with the Primarch's rage at Horus' betrayal. The mask's power causes it to replicate the gestures and movements of Dante's face, frightening his enemies.

His power armour is a gleaming gold, and it is said that watching him use his Jump Pack in battle is "like watching a flame of glory pass across the battlefield". He also has the Doom Gun, a special Fusion Weapon, created using technical knowledge long lost to the Adeptus Mechanicus, making it an extremely powerful firing weapon. Only a warrior as great and loyal to the Emperor of Mankind as Commander Dante is permitted to use such a weapon.

His other weapon is an immensely powerful Power Axe, the Mortalis Axe. This was created by the famed blacksmith of the Metriculus Chapter in the days following the Horus Heresy. Deeply saddened by the death of Sanguinius and the betrayal of the Traitor Legions, he sought to create a weapon that could cut down the Traitor Warmasters like the dogs they were. The result was the Mortalis Axe, a weapon that crackles with barely contained killing power, and is capable of cleaving the hardest ceramite and plasteel like a sharp knife through silk. Perfectly balanced, it is said to bear the curse of Sanguinius upon its skull-forged handle.

The Axe Mortalis became the ritual weapon of the Blood Angels Chapter Masters, having claimed the lives of countless heretics.