The Jericho Reach

The Jericho Reach, once known as the Jericho Sector, is a region of space close to the Eastern
Fringe of the Milky Way Galaxy in the Ultima Segmentum. This area of the galaxy was once a
part of the Imperium of Man in ancient days, remaining so for millennia until it fell into an age of
isolation, disintegration and evil. It has been lost to the Imperium for over four thousand Terran
years.

During those long millennia, many of its worlds became tainted by Chaos, whilst others were
infested by dangerous xenos. To recover the Reach and restore it to the Emperor's light, the
Imperium recently unleashed the Achilus Crusade.

The Achilus Crusade is a war of re-conquest fought on three fronts within the region. It is a
brutal conflict waged with every weapon that the Imperium possesses and its leaders have
sworn in the Emperor's name that they will never retreat and never surrender.

In spite of such intentions, the Achilus Crusade may yet fail. The growing T'au Empire, ever
mindful of opportunities to further spread the Greater Good, has cast covetous eyes over the
worlds and resources of the Reach and has initiated its own efforts to claim it.

On worlds long forsaken by the Imperium, the slaves of the Chaos Gods reign while at the
Reach's heart, unsuspected at the crusade's start, the servants of the Ruinous Powers have
created a blasphemous domain ruled by Daemon Princes and Chaos Lords, where the mutable
laws of the Warp rather than those of realspace govern the fragile bounds of space-time.

Even worse, from the depths of the intergalactic void the Great Devourer has once more made
itself known. The Tyranids of Hive Fleet Dagon seek to consume all the inhabited worlds that lie
within the Jericho Reach and leave nothing but the corpses of dead planets spread amongst
the ancient stars.

With the extraordinary discovery of the Jericho-Maw Warp Gate in 777.M41, a piece of
advanced technology whose mysterious creators remain unknown but which connects the
Eastern Fringe to the Calixis Sector of the Segmentum Obscurus, the possibility of using this
stable Warp conduit to launch an Imperial Crusade into the Jericho Reach and reclaim this
strategic area of space for the Imperium quickly found favour with the High Lords of Terra.

Lord Militant Tiber Achilus formulated a plan to undertake such a unique military campaign and
he proceeded to muster forces from the Adeptus Astartes, the Astra Militarum, the Adepta
Sororitas, and scores of Imperial Navy warships to enact the Emperor's will, all under his
command.

The High Lords were mindful, however, that the existence of such a Warp Gate offered dire
peril as well as opportunity, and under a shroud of the deepest secrecy, with the complicity of
the Inquisitorial masters of both the Calixis Sector and the Departmento Munitorum, launched
an Imperial Crusade from a staging point half-way across the galaxy from the territory it
intended to conquer.

The Imperium soon found itself faced with significant obstacles in bringing these goals to
fruition as the attempted re-conquest soon become mired in blood. The Achilus Crusade would
become a grinding conflict fraught with reversals of fortune and beset by enemies both
unexpected and nightmarish. As for the Lord Militant Achilus himself, he would not live to see
out the campaign's first decade.