Lucius the Eternal

The Champion

Lucius the Eternal was the Emperor's Children's premier swordsman during the Heresy and has remained so for ten thousand years. His original gift was natural — extraordinary speed, balance, and tactical instinct — but his Slaaneshi commitment, sealed during the Heresy, has refined the skill into something the Imperium's best human duellists are not equipped to face.

He has fought in every major Emperor's Children engagement of the Era Indomitus he could plausibly reach. He has, by Imperial pathology record, died perhaps two hundred times.

The Curse

Lucius's defining curse is the Pride. When he is killed — and he can be killed; he is, in immediate combat terms, mortal — the killer who experiences pride at having killed him becomes him. The killer's face slowly transforms into Lucius's face. The killer's skills slowly transform into Lucius's. Eventually the killer is, by every measurable standard, Lucius the Eternal, with all of the original's memories and a brief residual confusion about what just happened.

The curse can only be broken by killing Lucius without pride — a state most warriors who have just defeated a legendary swordsman cannot reliably achieve.

You have killed me. Look at your face. Look at it.

— Lucius, attributed to his successive successors

The Doppelgänger Blades

Lucius carries two blades — the Lash of Torment and the Blade Doppelgänger. The Doppelgänger has the unsettling property of replicating any weapon it strikes; if Lucius parries an Astartes power sword with it, the Doppelgänger briefly becomes that power sword and inherits its qualities.

In duels he uses the Doppelgänger to mirror the opponent's weapon, neutralising any technical advantage the opponent thought he had. The Lash he uses primarily for psychological effect.

M42

Lucius has been killed by Astartes Champions, Imperial Guard Commissars, Aeldari Phoenix Lords, and at least one Custodian. He has returned every time. The current Imperial doctrine for engaging him is to overwhelm with ranged firepower and avoid melee engagement entirely — the Imperial War Office has formally classified him as a Threat Tier where melee duels are tactically forbidden.

Lucius considers this disappointing.