Kor Phaeron

The Foster-Father

Kor Phaeron was a Colchisian priest of the Covenant when the infant Lorgar fell from the sky. Kor Phaeron recognised the child as the prophesied saviour-figure of his order's theology and adopted him. He taught the young Lorgar the entirety of Colchisian religious doctrine; he positioned him for the political coup that brought down the corrupt Covenant high cleric.

When Lorgar grew into the Primarch and was inducted into the Emperor's Crusade, Kor Phaeron — already old by mortal standards — was granted partial Astartes augmentation. The procedure was incomplete; he never achieved full Astartes physiology. But he gained the longevity and combat capacity to remain at his foster-son's side through the Crusade and the Heresy.

I taught him. The gods completed him. I remain to remind him of what he was first.

— Kor Phaeron, attributed late Heresy

The Conversion

Kor Phaeron was the second figure (after Erebus) to participate in the warp-pilgrimage that converted the Word Bearers to Chaos. His theology had always been more flexible than Lorgar's — he had been an opportunist priest in his Colchisian career — and he embraced the Dark Pantheon with even less hesitation than Lorgar himself.

Throughout the Heresy he commanded the Word Bearer fleet that attacked Calth in coordination with Erebus's ground operation. He was, by Heresy-era reckoning, the Legion's second-in-command after Lorgar.

After the Heresy

Kor Phaeron withdrew to the Maelstrom rift rather than the Eye of Terror following the Scouring. He established a personal fortress-monastery there from which he has, in the ten thousand years since, continued senior Word Bearer operations independent of Sicarus.

His relationship with Erebus has become difficult over time. Both consider themselves Lorgar's senior priest. Lorgar has not formally adjudicated between them. Both interpret the silence in their own favour.

M42

Kor Phaeron remains active in the Era Indomitus. He coordinates Word Bearer raids out of the Maelstrom alongside Huron Blackheart's Red Corsairs, with whom he maintains a working alliance. He has been observed in the Vashtorr-related campaigns on the periphery.

The Maelstrom remains, by Imperial intelligence reading, the second most important Chaos rift after the Eye of Terror. Kor Phaeron's presence is one of the reasons.