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Inquisitor ***Redacted***

First Hand Accounts of Imperial Guard Troops that have fought in Chaos Daemon incursions are important for understanding the psychological, physiological, and spiritual challenges that are to be expected when facing the forces of hell. They are uniquely disturbing and challenging, requiring the utmost effort in a spectrum of training to have any hope of surviving.

Warp/real space overlap causes many perceptual changes to occur. The brain’s capacity to perceive and filter information becomes warped. The senses blend into each other, a term known as synesthesia. Time dilates so that a mere moment can feel like hours to the experiencer. Emotional regulation becomes impossible. Transcendent and mystical experiences are widely reported. Feelings of “Being outside time and space” or “achieving ultimate truth” or “loss of identity or comprehension of self” are normal.

The accounts of the troops are the greatest way to truly appreciate the deeply profound and personal way they were challenged. Their identities have been kept hidden for purposes of anonymity.

Trooper 836485 Excerpt

“We had established a defensive line with a kill zone in front of us that was 100 meters of flat open terrain. When they entered this area, we planned on cutting loose with everything on full cyclic. We had everything ready. Mines, crewed served weapons, big stuff. We felt confident we would hold whatever came at us. There was a shimmering of light of all colors.

Inhuman shapes materialized from nothing inside the kill zone. I made eye contact with one of them. It was like it saw into me, became a part of me. It knew where I grew up, it knew how my father used to play ball with me in the back yard. It knew how I used to tug at my mother’s apron when she baked cookies. It was there before I was in the womb. It knew my entire life, everything pure and beautiful about my soul. And I knew that this daemon KNEW that I knew he was there specifically to destroy everything good and holy that was inside me. It had been anticipating this moment for all eternity and wanted nothing more than to feast on my soul. An entity of pure evil and hatred. The Antithesis of life.

*Uncontrollable weeping – Administered additional anti-anxiety drugs*

When faced with the knowledge that such a thing existed and was manifested right in front of you, its hard to describe the terror… Just pure terror. None of my training prepared me for that feeling. If you had asked me my name I would not have been able to tell you. I couldn’t move my body. I was frozen. There was a moment that seemed stretch on for hours, nothing was happening, no shooting, no sounds, just paralyzing terror.

Then the voice of the confessor boomed out “In the name of the Emperor, send them back to hell!” I was overcome with a lightning bolt of energy. I was charged with the light of the Emperor. I felt my strength return in my limbs. It was as if I was no longer in control of my body. I was above myself, watching myself fighting heroically despite being in an overrun battle with these abominations. But I knew that whatever happened my soul would return to the Emperor.

Later on after the battle, I asked one of my comrades, why did no one fire for so long? Why were the daemons allowed to stand there for such a lengthy duration before anyone opened fire? But after we reviewed the helmet cam recordings, I was dumb founded to learn that the moment of terror that seemed to entrap me for hours of despair was a mere seconds. It was the warp effects altering perceptions. The experience taught me that a trooper’s greatest weapon is his faith in the Emperor. That is the only thing that will allow you to face the forces of hell.”