"Only in Death does Duty end." Pfffffffffffft ..for the Astra Militarum maybe..

I see Halloween has an entire year in the lore

The year of ghosts was the year where Halloween lasted an entire year thanks to an Administratum error in the Imperial calendar. The Inquisition covered up the incompetence of the Administratum with that brief description.

It's a year where Imperial Guard Regiments equip their new Proton Packs and test it out. Busting makes them feel good as it raises morale.

"Only in death does duty end" *Stares in servitor and cyberskull*

The most heretical lore, locked deep within Inquisitorial archives, suggests that humanity was plagued by daemonic entities known as “spooky scary skeletons”.

How do witnesses of these ghosts know they were servants of the Emperor? They were lead by a headless primarch.

Obscure 40k lore: Exists 40k Theories: (bursts through wall) I hAvE a ThEoRY! Fans: post memes. We all know this is true, if you don’t think so look at half the Doot comments.

Inquisitor Archivist: Right, I see here we're censoring the Age of Ghosts. No problem, what's the reason though? I need it for the filing. Lord Inquisitor: Ghosts are scary :'( Inquisitor Archivist: ...okay. Fine. Whatever. We've censored for worse reasons.

"Year of the Ghosts" So... Ferrus Manus was bugging anyone and everyone as a Skost head for an entire year?

Let’s be honest, in the horrifying, grimdark future every day is Halloween. Just less candy and more purging.

Maybe Corvus swooping around in the warp made the spirits of the warp restless. Perhaps it has something to do his new form.

Revenant Astarties have to be the most badass thing in this universe 💀 Even in death, do they serve 🤘

"You are weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaak, Vulcan!"

It was an Administratum typo, it was actually The Year Of Goats when the Draenei invaded

“The Year of the Ghost” was actually the year we’re the largest amount of people were ‘ghosted’ by their significant other ever recorded in human history. The amount so huge that it was believed that it encompassed the whole imperium. The only reason why details are scarce is because you don’t want to dig up painful pasts.

I like the idea that the Year of Ghosts was when the Legion of the Damned achieved "Daemonhood" (canonisation?), as opposed to being temporary half-formed manifestations of lost Loyalist Legionnaires from the Heresy that the Emperor had to consciously conjure. Modern Damned Legionnaires tend to manifest as wearing MK8 armour with rarer examples of earlier marks and obscured/destroyed iconography, so the majority of them should be the echoes or warp-spirits of more recently deceased Astartes. When great warp-entities come into their power they tend to cause significant manifestations in Realspace, for better or worse, so this could also be the point in time where the Warpside "God-Emperor" awakened and started to take up the baton that meat-Emperor had dropped... Living Saints would become fully empowered, Miracles could be described as truly "divine" as opposed to Emperor-assisted Psyker powers and intense faith in Him could start actually being a useful thing with practical applications rather than just coincidence/psychic placebo effect. This assumes the idea that the Legion of the Damned are "Lesser Daemons of the God-Emperor", of course.

40k is the only media were things are so dark Necromancy is actually benevolent magic.

This video reminded me of an event in Horus Heresy Book Six: Retribution (page 70 in the paperback version) It's described as "the dead walked on Xana II", that the "broken bodies" of Legionnaires slain on Isstvan V (and some appearing with the livery of those slain during the Great Crusade) came to life and attacked traitor forces, aided by equally damaged Dreadnoughts and "half-wrecked tanks and rapier weapons platforms".

"duty only ends in death" "Even in death I serve -a bloodraven dreadnaught

_Adeptus Notificatus, _*_REPRESENT._* or be counted a ghost

Even the 41st millenium is not safe from Spooktober.

Perhaps it was a large amount of Imperial Saints coming from the warp along with and Incredibly high amount of sightings of Legion of the Damned in a long-forgotten Black Crusade

Oooh, _dammit._ I am sitting here, with a nasty infection of my eyes that makes my eyelids swollen and keeps me from wearing my glasses and I was actually reading _"The Year of Goats"._ As a result, I was a bit baffled when you began talking about ghosts all of a sudden, wondering how goats would eventually fit into this. Well, I finally realised my mistake and "ghosts" definitely makes more sense, but I must confess that I am still a bit disappointed.

Love the work here Remleiz. The "Year of Ghosts" has always interested me because there's only really a single sentence about it but there's a lot of books that do list the event in the timeline. Including mentioning that one of the Space Marine foundings was done right afterwards. Odd theory I always had about it? It was the burning of the last Great Crusade era Dreadnoughts. A lot of times in stories I see marines referring to the Dreadnought Brothers as being already dead as it were. Even to the point where things like "Dante is the oldest living marine" even though Bjorn the Fell-Handed exists, etc. To me it's a possible way to square the circle of what happened to all these ancient and supposedly superior Dreadnoughts that existed in the Horus Heresy series, as well as why Bjorn is the only one from that time. The Honored Dead (Dreadnoughts) that normally were on ice as it were from the Great Crusade thrown en masse into the heat of battle. Massive Ancient Chaos Horus Heresy Dreadnoughts vs Loyalist Dreadnought wars as only those already dead/crazed brothers could hope to survive against the twisted abomination dreadnoughts. Absolutely zero evidence for it of course. It was just a neat theory I had and to explain why all the supposedly strictly superior patterns of dreadnought weren't around in anything but fanfiction in the present. But also kind of the problem with the Horus Heresy series retconning Marines to have superior technology in the Great Crusade than they do in 40k contrary to other prior evidence.

These are the blessings of the Emperor and the Honored Dead are those that ever close to his spirit. In that, they are likely those that have faithfully served him throughout the ages.

I can see it: An entire regiment of Skeletons rise up, fix bayonets and proceed to spooking the traitors

While I do believe the Year of Ghosts is more in reference to an massive increase in sightings of the Legion of the Damned, the idea of a 'faith virus' reanimating the faithful dead to battle Warpspawn does have a certain "charm" to it...if by that, you mean the idea that it's frikkin' awesome.

Could it be an ost of dreadnoughts that all went back online at the same time and did indeed fight some warp horrors ? That is the way I remember understanding this line anyway

Its either ferrus manus skost, Emperor trolling or just tzeeentch getting bored. Also nice vid for spoopy month

I am in the camp that dead warriors brought back to fight. Since the legion of the dammed are not technically dead.

Commisar: only in death does duty end! Everyone else: Even in death i still serve...

So basically the Emprah, sorry the “All-Father”, is Odín, and he summons the Einherjar to fight for him. Right.

3:11 It seems that the king as returned, and made those of the dead fulfill their oath

Until refuted, I will imagine grimdark Ghostbusters with ghosts chilling and being goofy until very large angry people strike them down with unconventional weaponry.

i have seen these entities only twice before.... Mysterious brothers indeed..

Be honest who else was nerdy enough to also say the line “only in death does duty end” along with him xD

A very extremely great video as always 40k Theories.

In all this talk of spooky times we are forgetting about Slaaneshmas. Only a few months away little warplings!

I hope GW investigates this tidbit further. Could be very interesting. On a related note, I hope you cover the Noctis Aeterna some time soon. There is so little info and some of it is contradictory. I'd love to see the information codified, especially considering it includes what is supposedly the largest known manifestation of the Legion of the Damned on record.

clones of any number of past warriors might also be interpreted as "the honored dead rising up", or people who were even mistakenly considered dead who then returned or came out of hiding to swoop in to the rescue might be considered "risen". necrons, too, might appear to the untrained eye as "the honored dead" if they were observed from a distance fighting demons. too many possibilities and too little information.

Another great one!

Doot Doot said mr.skeltal and brought good bones.

Love the new intro!

The spoopy year!

You missed the possibility of warp based shenanigans bringing people that should already be dead forward in time and then kicking them back to their proper time afterwards so they can die

I'm waiting for "The Year of Ghosts (Who Sit Around Playing Poker)" to occur in the All Guardsmen Party ;P

Love your videos

Eldar constructs are refered to as ghosts or wraiths i think. correct me if im wrong. Could this event refer to eldar intervention?

Spooky scary skeletons. Sending shivers down yo--BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!!

In shorts stories about thunder warriors along with the “Outcast Dead” novel Thunder Warriors call dead members of the legion the “honored dead” and strive for an “honored death” for the emperor. This can be seen particularly in “Dreams of Unity” from the Heralds of the Seige HH anthology. As they fall to insanity they strive for death in combat rather than being put down like mad dogs in order to join the “honored dead.” Possibly the year of ghosts involved the large scale production of another legion of thunder warriors to fight these daemons. Or the thunder legion rose again in ghostly form to defend Terra? If the high lords had access to the tech creating thunder warriors to fight daemons would make sense. In “angels of Calliban” a surviving member of the original legion (before it was called the 1st legion) was described as having impenetrable psychic defenses by Cypher and Luthor. This legionnaire says that this defense was provided to all of the Thunder Warriors and Space Marine Legion fighting for unity because they fought so many daemons.

I could see the year of ghost relating to the 2 lost legions that were wiped from imperial archives with an event they did during this time being significant but would have to be erased do too the empowers wishes.

Has there been evidence of the emperor not just sealing, but brute forcing his way through the Tarren webway access? Psychically it doesn’t seem like he’s ever gotten weaker just more agitated. Could see him using this to channel his power with precision in multiple areas.

Can you do a video that covers a broad view of magic? There are bits and pieces in a lot of your videos, and the wiki has a flawed explanation, but a more complete lore with the correlation between body, soul, warp and magic would be interesting to see.

A few other alternatives- an early encounter with necrons (an undead race) due to their hostile interactions with the warp or perhaps a group of Eldar wraith construct fighting to close a major Warp rift.

My 1st thought (and after watching still think it could be) is it refers to dreadnoughts. Perhaps all space marines took a vacation that year and the venerable battle-brothers had to take up the slack?

Laddie, They were no ghosts. A band of slayers wandered in from Warhammer Fantasy and kicked their wee asses back into the warp.

Hold on...'slaughtered legions'? Could this be a reference to the 2 unknown ones?

While diving deeper into the lore, it seems more and more likely that the Emperor does not mind or otherwise might need the Imperium's veneration of him as a god. If he can intervene in such extensive ways, surely he could manifest in some ways to correct this mistake at least partially. (Might also be it would cause too much inwards conflict)

In universe the lack of information could be caused by the Inquisition classifying everything. Most of the possibilities you mentioned would fit with their MO (especially the final one). Hard to say for certain which is more probable Outside of the universe I dont thing GW will explore every small line they put so we might never know for certain what they intended

Happy 40k Spooktober everyone!

Wouldn't the honored dead be the imperial dreadnoughts ? So wouldn't this entail that a legion on dreadnoughts was created/ appeared to fight the enemy ?

the first thing that came to mind for me was dreadnaughts, maybe a whole army of them. I mean imagine how many there must have been in the aftermath of the Horus Heresy. Maybe too many even for the newly formed chapters so a bunch were locked away and then in this emergency, unleashed.

I could be wrong about the name but the Flame Hawks who could cover there entire bodies in flames would be my first guess to who the Legion of the Damned could possibly be. I know they were destroyed by a company of Great Knights but some did escape who maybe stayed loyal to the Emperor.

So as the Emperor's mind slowly fractures under the strain of the millennia spent in an undead state on the Golden Throne maybe part of his mind is sending out his daemons "The Legion of the Damned" to fight for his kingdom in the material realm. I wonder if they'll write books about the Emperor's battles in the warp during this time.

Busting makes my morale high.

Could have been something involving dreadnoughts. They are basically a coffin mixed with a weapons platform.

That sounds really spooky yeah what are terrifying frames and 40K we only talked about a lot

Beware the foes of the imperium for the Legion of the damned fight for the imperium always

Spoopy.

Any thought to the idea that the legion of the damned could be one of the two lost legions, or a combination of both? Attempting to regain the honor lost for whatever transgressions they may have made to cause their purging from imperial record?

"Honored dead" - maybe, just maybe it was somehow related to dreadnoughts? Like a lots of Venerable Dreadnoughts fighting with deamons?

This puts into question the meaning of “only in death does duty end”. Define death. Is it simply physical or the extinguishing of a soul? In that case, are blanks living dead?

Emperor damn it, I can't believe we missed the skeleton war.

2:35 - (monotone) All hail Big Papa Ultrasmurf. | The barrier between the material universe and the Immaterium must've been particularly weak that year. | 3:47 - Ah...the Daemons of the Emperor...as the Emperor protects. | 5:20 - They're the followers of that which the Aeldari would call "She Who Thirsts" and they're not Fulgrim's boys. | 7:12 - (monotone) All hail the Ultrasmurfs. | 8:50 - Oh yeah, that one. | Zombies are mostly due to Nurgle.

Sooo even in death duty never ends...

When spooky month becomes a spooky year

I think the Rule of Cool determines the truth.

I guess all the spirits of every intelligent life Souls just fought against chaos or just the Legion of the Damned doing all the work. Really doe now

That some messed up Nic Cage logic using unearthly supernatural powers to bring someone back to life just to kill them again.

Was the Skost of Ferrus Manus the Not Friend present at all during the year going around telling everyone that they are weak?

Astra militarum regiments that lay dead on the fields pick up their arms and stand against baffled traitors on a planet close to the eye of terror

Huh. My guess was it had to do with the return of some imperial force long thought dead or expunged. Like a company of one of the two forgotten legions turning up.

Perhaps the Emperor engineered the geneseed for another purpose: a psychic connection between an astartes warrior and the Emperor that lets Him store the souls of His fallen warriors away from the Ruinous Powers. Considering that the Emperor exists across the materium, the webway, and the warp, he could be building a "space" or "existence" where the souls of loyal humans can still benefit the Imperium.

I remember reading a story, but can't for the life of me remember any other details, about something similar where an Imperial city was under siege and every night the ghosts of the dead would rise and attack the living. I remember the tolling of a bell being involved. Can anyone enlighten me about it so I can elaborate further because its REALLY bugging me.

9:16 - wasn't aware of this (sadly kind of behind on the lore). What was Ahriman's response to this?

Okay, so... one WarSmurf officer aside... could at least some of the Legion of the Damned... be the remains of The Damned Legion?

SPOOKY SCARY LEGIONARY

So lemme get this straight, there was, potentially, a zombie apocalypse that was BENEFICIAL to mankind? An army of Bubs?!

A part of me hopes that it's written about in a Black Library book at some point but another part hopes it isn't because I like the idea of ambiguity. In history we don't know everything, we don't know the personalities, flaws and motivations of every significant figure in history, we can only guess. It's part of the reason why I think the depiction of the Emperor can be so finicky. Is the Emperor a hero or a villain or somewhere in the grey? I think it's best left unanswered but implied. Personally I think a Legion of the Damned scenario might be to explain but instead of it just being dead Space Marines but the most honored of the Imperial Guard. There like at 10,000 more martyrs in 40k than in real life that are normal mortals and so if the Emperor had enough power and was desperate enough to hold off the horrors of the warp could have used the power generated from the worship dedicated to him, and the innumerable saints and martyrs of the Imperial Faith to halt the warp incursions.

And yet nobody called Emps out when he summoned those warriors

How about the War of the Ostriches. And the Year of Swole.

Isn't it, like, 3 and a half weeks early for a Halloween video?

Dont ever get discouraged

What if the legion of the damned was one of the emperors creations directly upon terra, before the great crusade? They might even be the legions of the forgotten loyal primarch?

Anyone else see that the Aquila is the 30k one not the 40k one on 40k theories title card

Not even in death does duty end!

It was Ferrus Manus that started the event.

Dreadnaughts having a party

"So let's say someone blew this "Horn of Winter" and the dead rose from the crypts to defeat the forces of Chaos." "Sounds heretical. How about the truth?" "That Khorne got stabbed to death by a little girl?" "OK, warrior ghosts it is."