The Despoilers practise the oldest and most patient way of Chaos: not raiding, not slaughter for its own sake, but conquest that endures. These are the god-marked warlords who do not merely defeat a land but master it, planting black iron fortresses in the hearts of the territories they take and ruling from them as dark kings. Where a Ravager passes through and is gone, a Despoiler stays — and the longer he stays, the more the land around him changes.
For the true work of a Despoiler begins after the battle is won. From his fastness the corruption spreads outward like a stain: rivers curdle, forests twist into thorned and whispering shapes, the very stones remember terrible new things. Season by season the conquered realm is warped into a mirror of its master's gift-riddled soul, and the people who remain are remade alongside it — taught first to fear, then to obey, then at last to worship. This is the ambition the Dark Gods prize above the bloodiest tally: to seize, to corrupt, and to enthrone oneself so wholly that the realm itself is made to kneel. A Despoiler does not want a province plundered and abandoned; he wants a kingdom that is his in body and spirit, a monument to his favour still spreading its poison long after his own fall.
Slaves to Darkness
Order of battle
The Despoilers field the units of the Slaves to Darkness — a detachment from the roster:
Kindred formations
Other Slaves to Darkness formations
CabalistsSorcerer-led covens who climb the Path to Glory by ritual rather than by axe, binding daemons the way other legions break horses. Their masters read the winds of magic like ledgers, and every miracle they purchase is paid for in someone else's soul.
Knights of the Empty ThroneThe Varanguard ridden to war as a legion — circles of former champions who surrendered their own destinies to carry Archaon's, the deadliest mortal cavalry in existence. They are named for the seat no god may claim above their master: a throne kept empty until the Everchosen decides whose war everything has been all along.
RavagersEver-moving storm-hordes of tribes and warbands, gathering strength the way an avalanche gathers stone as they sweep from realm to realm. Ravager warlords rise faster than any others on the Path to Glory — and are replaced just as fast, for a horde built on momentum follows only the champion who never stops winning.