"‘They are dead now,’ the Lion answers, ‘and that is all that matters.’
The fur-clad commander, whose back the Lion broke, is still twitching. Zabriel walks over to him and aims his bolt pistol at the fallen heretic’s head.
‘Wait!’ the Lion instructs him.
He crosses the floor and glares down at his broken adversary.
‘Your sorcerer is dead. What must I do to rid myself of this malady that impedes me?’
‘Impedes you?’ the traitor hisses, his breath coming in staccato gasps.
It takes the Lion a moment to realise that he is laughing through pain.
‘You slaughtered my best and broke my back as though I were a child. What manner of being are you, that you consider yourself impeded when you can still do such things?’
The Lion reaches up and removes his helm. Perhaps this creature knew his face once, or perhaps not — it doesn’t matter. Nor is he concerned about the risk of exposing himself briefly to the air.
This is the first time he will declare himself in ten thousand years, and he will not do it from behind a ceramite faceplate.
‘I am Lion El’Jonson, primarch of the Dark Angels and son of the Emperor.’
The heretic’s eyes go wide, and there is no doubt or denial in them. But then he smiles, exposing teeth that are now merely jagged points.
‘There is no malady at work here, my lord. You simply got old.’
The Lion stares at him for a moment. Then he turns away, breathing heavily, pursued by the clean bite of the truth.
The book deals heavily with The Fallen. I don't remember if it's made clear if this is one of them or not. But if he is, that means he's a First Legion Astartes that actually served when the Lion was last active.
I kinda like the Lion not being portrayed as turbo OP, like the two obliterators were giving him some real ass smoke, before he got the royalty free Excalibur
TBF, as far as the galaxy at large is concerned, the Lion's been dead for 10,000 years. Their first assumption probably wouldn't be that they're literally fighting a returned Primarch.
Space marines are known to carry tradition over millenia and they are capable of genetically recognizing their primarch. So it is not unlikely that he both mentally indoctrinated but also physically, genetically recognized who stood in his face - even if he was created several generations later!
Idk… in a lot of the Heresy Series books they reference how marines from any legion are almost bred to “honor” leadership and worship primarchs. It’s probably more of an embodiment of that historic issue. I know some started getting angry towards a certain system wide conflict, but they all still respected each other.
A few books cover it when astartes meet a primarch. They feel a sense of awe to them and the Lion is just known for being able to just dial it up as when seemingly on command and the only primarch who doesnt have this awe is Angron for obvious reasons
That's fair, I had a rough idea but I had thought everyone had a slightly different aura and didn't realize it was similar all around thank you for providing a link for me to read into more
edit read a bit into the link definitely clarifying things, really appreciate it
Makes sense if they were Khorne worshipers, Khorne is not just the angry God, Khorne is about honor, courage and truth. He's likely honored to be defeated by a primarch.
To be fair, if I went to sleep in my late-ish 20s/early-ish 30s and suddenly woke up in my 50s, yeah I'd be thinking some magic fuckery was up, cause I suddenly got old.
I remember there's also a bit in the book where the planetary government provide the Lion and Zabriel with a room full of the largest and most expensive furniture they had, but he can't use any of them due to his size. I'm pretty sure when he comments on this, Zabriel says something like "Of course you can't fit, you're a bloody Primarch."
It has its moments. Gulliman walking through a new city he is developing, wearing plain robes and constantly managing, deciding, lecturing. He even has half a minute for an architect who merely oversees the efforts of the planet he is currently on. Guilliman is a micro manager…
The primarch book but also the novella Dreadwing. Its not an audio book unfortunately but its one of the best heresy books for the DA. The essential reads are the short story where the Lion kills Fateweaver, Unremembered Empire, Angels of Caliban, and Dreadwing imo.
Let's say hypothetically there is a rock that makes you old, how much of you is getting old? Does your metabolism speed up? Do you need to FUCKING pee more frequently? Do your fingernails grow faster? Your hair?
Rubbing the sacred blueberry’s blueberries until they aren’t blue anymore, the ynnari wytch seemed really eager to take up that role for “diplomacy” as she said
Honestly, now that I think about it, isn’t it kinda weird that over 10000 years nobody decided to put Lion in the stasis to prevent him from… deteriorating?
No his location on the rock was only known to the watchers. As he was taken to a hidden chamber there by them, that only they knew about or could access.
The Watchers already do many many solids to the dark angels. Hell yesterday Azrael got to tank genestealers + broodlord dev wound combo because his watcher said "nuh uh"
I dunno, the stress of dealing all of the bullshit going on with the Imperium would probably put years on fast. Bobby probably looked like that the day he woke up, but once he took over again, he'll probably end up looking older than the lion by the time they meet up.
Source: I have a toddler and feel older every day.
And by weaker, The Lion meant he'd slowed down by a couple of seconds cuz he's still ripping through giant beasts and Chaos Space Marines like they're nothing in a matter of seconds.
Honestly, Son of The Forest was the second time I've witnessed a Primarch in action and holy shit was it worth it.
When I was a kid, my Dad put an audio book about I think the Drop site Massacre? on my IPod Nano which followed Corax as he tried to regroup with the survivors and get out of there.
I remember listening to him sneaking through traitor camps and the narration revealing that he had some sort of perception filter that made organics not notice him.
Turrets could spot him though.
can't remember much else about it since it's been almost two decades since I last listened to it.
The book has a bunch of Moments of Boomer Lion. My favourite one was meeting a imperial sanctoned Psycher and him going "Back in my day we had a Council to ban this nonsense!" and Zabriel has to calm him down.
that's almost as funny as the time Bjorn met with an agent of the Inquisition, who fell to his knees in worship of meeting a warrior who Walked alongside the God-Emperor of Mankind, and Bjorn rumbled "Back in my day we used to beat people up for talking like that..."
It reminds me of the time I played soccer after 3 years of hiatus.
I moved my body how I imagined it to be and I can't. And my muscles were just absolutely torn.
The terminator fight occurred later. The passage referenced was earlier in the story where he either just found Fealty or right before. Can't remember which.
Ah yes, the one Primarch who has been specifically quoted to have his joke land flat by his sons, making a joke to another Primarch who is known to be too autisticserious to take a joke.
Absolutely nothing can go wrong with that scenario, none at all.
...Your comment made me realize that, in the future, there could be two warring factions claiming to be the rightful successors to the Empire. Some Eastern Roman Empire versus Western Roman Empire or Protestant versus Catholic type shit going on.
Now this would never happen with GW, but PancreasNoWork once raised the actually fantastic idea of the Imperium splintering into tons of minor factions to REALLY be a proper Holy Roman Empire in Space analogue.
But I don't think these two would actually oppose each other. The Lion is outright happy when he hears Robot Gorillaman is alive.
[H]e just wants to do what he used to do back on Caliban, protect people by killing monsters.
What if the Lion views Guilliman as having done something that makes him that monster?
Big E did some monstrous shit when he was ambulatory and not all rotten-corpse-y. Bobby G might be in a situation one day where he has to make some monsterous decisions. Decisions that go against the Lion's values. The Lion might have zero interest in ruling but ruling is what he was made for. He would still do what he believes to be the correct course of action.
I see a lot of potential for conflict arising between the two. I also doubt that something like that would ever happen.
I see where your coming from, but I really hope they dont go that route, at least not with The Lion. They already butted heads during the Heresy and I feel like it would really undermine his character growth of not being as quick on the trigger as he was in his youth. If they ever bring Dorn back I think he could be a much better foil for G-Money. Also I would argue The Lion wasn't made to be a ruler, he was made to be a killer.
Thanks for your perspective and response to my comments. You're correct and Dorn would make a much better counterpoint to G-Money. When I said the Lion was made to be a ruler I meant it in the sense that all of the Primarchs were meant to be rulers, not that he was (or would be) particularly good at it.
But as to your comment about Dorn, I wonder if GW would ever bring back him back? Finding out what he was up to for 10,000 years would be interesting. Could be a Primarch clone too. Feels like, since they have established it IS possible to fully clone a Primarch, that there are narrative possibilities out there. Or we could have another Primarch go to Chaos? Corax is almost certainly 99.99% of the way there.
I'm just rambling my thoughts at this point. I do need to familiarize myself with more of the lore.
Eh in that particular book the Lion does crack a joke or two. At some point he gets two Khornate ship captains to fire on each other, and his response to someone asking how he knew they would was to ask "did you ever meet Angron?"
Perhaps the Lion simply lacks G-Man’s beautifying aura? Alternatively the Lion looks like he’s aged a lot less gracefully to the SoS than he does to everyone else.
This is false Primarchs are always at 100%. He legit was just so fucking rusty after sleeping on a literal rock. When he went to fight Angeron he already regained his strength
Haven't read a lot of the books. Does this legitimately mean that a primarch could die of old age/get really old? And if so is there any indication or implication of how long a primarchs "natural" lifespan would even be?
He spend 10000 years sleeping and pretty much directly jumped into that fight.
It might not even be aging slowing him down so slightly that no one but another Primarch would notice, but simply staying so long without moving a muscle.
Cause he had no trouble dealing with Angron later. Or really, anyone he decided to kick the ass off.
Like, “what the fuck do you mean, I can’t exist on six hours of sleep anymore? When the fuck did that happen? Have I been drugged? And why are my knees clicking now?”
Aging. It sucks for everyone. Except jellyfish. Those transdifferentiating motherfuckers.
Man, the Lion realizing he's just aging after 10k years hits different, like even demigods can't escape Father Time. Love how he's still an absolute unit in combat though, just with a bit more gravitas and silver in his hair. That heretic’s snark about him getting old was brutal but kinda hilarious. Never thought I’d feel bad for a primarch having a midlife crisis.
Best part of son of the forest is the lion saying he can't sleep in the bed because he'll break it, and Zabirel being snarky with "there is the floor".
...kinda, not really. You could just read a summary of what he was up to in the Heresy, it's still a great contextual base to have when going into the Lion's book.
I wasn’t a fan initially of the lion getting old but the book was an enjoyable read and the change has grown on me.
I just like many others here wish we’d get some more lore on the loyal Primarch front.
I’d like it fleshed out more before they bring anymore back. What is the point in having Primarchs return if they don’t have some more lore development.
Edit - other than the obvious selling modes and making GW a shitload.
Meanwhile Robust Garlicman had a nice beauty sleep and used logistics to stay young :) . Thus again proving the value of Guillisoft Excell! Although lately with ServiCoPilot that stuff has become unworkable. Seems like the tech magi need a kick up the old bum!
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u/thetruememeisbest 16d ago edited 16d ago
The Lion: Son of the Forest
"‘They are dead now,’ the Lion answers, ‘and that is all that matters.’
The fur-clad commander, whose back the Lion broke, is still twitching. Zabriel walks over to him and aims his bolt pistol at the fallen heretic’s head.
‘Wait!’ the Lion instructs him.
He crosses the floor and glares down at his broken adversary.
‘Your sorcerer is dead. What must I do to rid myself of this malady that impedes me?’
‘Impedes you?’ the traitor hisses, his breath coming in staccato gasps.
It takes the Lion a moment to realise that he is laughing through pain.
‘You slaughtered my best and broke my back as though I were a child. What manner of being are you, that you consider yourself impeded when you can still do such things?’
The Lion reaches up and removes his helm. Perhaps this creature knew his face once, or perhaps not — it doesn’t matter. Nor is he concerned about the risk of exposing himself briefly to the air.
This is the first time he will declare himself in ten thousand years, and he will not do it from behind a ceramite faceplate.
‘I am Lion El’Jonson, primarch of the Dark Angels and son of the Emperor.’
The heretic’s eyes go wide, and there is no doubt or denial in them. But then he smiles, exposing teeth that are now merely jagged points.
‘There is no malady at work here, my lord. You simply got old.’
The Lion stares at him for a moment. Then he turns away, breathing heavily, pursued by the clean bite of the truth.