Rediscovery Horus was the first Primarch to be rediscovered by the Emperor during the early Great Crusade.

Because of this early discovery, Horus grew to be the most powerf ul among the Primarchs as he had grown up from a child to an adult at the side o f the Emperor. For a long time he was the only Primarch to have been discovered. Friendship between the Emperor and Horus grew rapidly and the Emperor eventuall y trusted him enough to give him command of the entire force of the Imperium. Th e Emperor had saved Horus's life at the siege of Reillis as they fought back to back. At another battle, Horus repaid this debt when he hacked the arm off a fre nzied Ork as it tried to choke the life out of the Emperor on the planet of Gorr o.[5] The Great Crusade Horus and his brother Fulgrim during the Great Triumph after the Ullanor Crusade . As the Emperor and the Great Crusade marched on, Horus proved himself to be a ta ctical genius. He knew precisely which force to send and where to send it, showi ng no mercy to those that opposed the Emperor but sparing the innocent from unne cessary bloodshed. After the Ullanor Crusade, in which an Ork empire was defeate d, the Emperor, considering the crusade to be Horus' greatest victory yet, saw f it to partially transfer control of the Great Crusade to Horus, raising him to t he rank of Warmaster, the highest official beneath the Emperor himself, and gran ting him command over any and all Imperial forces, as well as other rights and h onours. In these, the last years of the Great Crusade, Horus would encourage the other Primarchs to compete against each other in order to discover the stronges t and most able of his companions and to improve their fighting abilities, as we ll as lead his own personal forces into several notable campaigns. It was after one of these campaigns - the first contact with the Interex - that Horus chose t o exercise his right, granted by the Emperor, to rename his personal legion: The Luna Wolves were renamed the Sons of Horus.[2] The Betrayal Horus during the Heresy[Needs Citation] During a mission on the Feral World Davin, Horus was wounded in battle by a blad e of Nurgle wielded by the Chaos-corrupted Eugen Temba. Falling unconscious, und er the advice of Erebus, the natives of the world helped to heal him. However un known to the desperate Mournival, the healers and Erebus himself had all since b ecome corrupted by Chaos and were orchestrating the entire series of events. Ere bus himself was working under the orders of his Primarch Lorgar. Having his dyin g body moved to the Serpent Lodge, Horus was soon subjected to an ancient Chaos ritual by the Davin priests, while Erebus entered his mind disguised as the dece ased Hastur Sejanus. This image of Sejanus showed Horus horrifying visions of th e future, where the Emperor ruled as a god and had discarded the Primarchs once they had outlived their usefulness. Erebus also told Horus that the Gods of Chao s were peaceful beings with little interest in the Materium, and it was the Empe ror that was intent on destroying their realm on his quest for godhood. Most dis turbing for Horus, he was told that the Emperor had used the powers of the Warp to create the Primarchs. Despite realizing early on that this Sejanus was but an impostor, Horus nonetheless accepted these revelations and his bitterness towar ds the Emperor, already growing from his fathers isolation and Secret Project on Terra as well as the formation of the Council of Terra (essentially subordinati ng the Primarchs to mortal humans), finally manifested in outright hostility. Th e only attempt to stop the conversion of Horus came from his brother Magnus the Red, who entered Horus' mind but was unable to interfere with the powerful ritua ls of the Davin Cultists or convince Horus to remain loyal to the Emperor.[2a] After his experience on Davin, Horus agreed to align with the powers of Chaos in order to overthrow the Emperor, which he had become convinced was a corrupt dic tator bent on achieving godhood and forsaking his sons in favor of mortal rulers

. The Warmaster soon introduced the taint to the Legions under his direct comman d, converting Angron of the World Eaters, Fulgrim of the Emperor's Children, and Mortarion of the Death Guard to his cause. Eventually, Horus was also able to s ecretly recruit Konrad Curze of the Night Lords, Alpharius Omegon of the Alpha L egion, and Perturabo of the Iron Warriors. Horus also converted Fabricator-Gener al of the Adeptus Mechanicus Kelbor-Hal, founding the Dark Mechanicum, as well a s many units of the Imperial Army.[9] Heresy Horus moved, along with several other secretly traitor legions, to Isstvan III, seemingly in order to suppress a rebellion and reinstate Imperial control. Once he arrived however, he sent down specially selected troops from all four of the legions with him, sending down all those he knew would never join him in open re bellion. Once they were on the planet he proceeded to virus bomb the entire worl d and killed billions of inhabitants in seconds, along with hundreds of space ma rines, and a ground war eliminated the remainder[3]. The psychic shock wave from this event was said to be louder than the Astronomican. Horus then redeployed h is forces to Isstvan V where he was met by seven Space Marine legions sent to br ing him to Terra to face an inquest into his actions on Isstvan III. Four of the se seven legions proceeded to rebel against the Emperor. It now became obvious t hat Horus had massive power as he hunted down the three legions that had stayed loyal. Only a few Space Marines managed to escape his forces and make it back to Terra, and among those killed was Ferrus Manus, Primarch of the Iron Hands.[4] Horus prepares to battle the Emperor. [Needs Citation] Horus then set a course to fight his way through the Imperium in an attempt to r each Terra and, ultimately, to kill the Emperor and place himself on the throne. After much fighting, death and betrayal (see Battle of Terra for further inform ation), Horus realised he would have to hurry his attacks in order to secure Ter ra in time for him to set up the defences sufficiently to prevent the arrival of two loyal Space Marine legions which could potentially turn the balance back in the favour of the Emperor. To this end, Horus ordered the void shields of his f lagship dropped to entice the Emperor aboard for one final conflict. Somehow, th e loyalist forces arrived scattered throughout the ship, and Sanguinius, Primarc h of the Blood Angels, appeared before Horus, who offered him riches and power i f he denounced his allegiance to the Emperor. Sanguinius refused and attacked. H orus killed him and was found standing over his broken body when the Emperor ent ered the chamber[Needs Citation]. Horus battles the Emperor The Emperor and Horus fought with a power that would have eviscerated any mortal man dozens of times over with each blow. The Emperor held back for much of the battle, remembering Horus as his beloved son and not wishing to believe that he had turned so utterly to Chaos. This allowed Horus to inflict crippling mortal w ounds on the Emperor, since nothing short of the Emperor's full power would be s ufficient to defeat him. At the critical point in the battle, a lone Adeptus Cus tode guard entered the room (while others state the lone warrior to be Ollanius Pius, an Imperial Army soldier). Horus flayed him alive with but a look and in t hat instant the Emperor realised how far his favoured son had fallen. The sacrif ice of the Custodian bought the Emperor time to deliver a finishing blow to Horu s. With iron resolve, he gathered his full strength and delivered a massive psyc hic blow that killed Horus almost instantly and obliterated his very soul. In hi s final moments, the powers of Chaos were driven from him and the Emperor sensed his favoured son's return to sanity for a fraction of a second before he finall y died[Needs Citation]. Horus's body After the battle, the warship was won back by the forces of Chaos led by Ezekyle Abaddon, Captain of the 1st Company. Abaddon found Horus's body and ordered the retreat into the Eye of Terror. The body of Horus is said to have been put on d

isplay in a temple, the Sons of Horus revering the Warmaster even in death. At t he end of a series of inter-traitor wars, the fortress of the Sons was destroyed , and the body of Horus stolen by the Emperor's Children. To the disgust of the Sons, the body was used to create at least one clone of Horus (see also Fabius B ile). The Sons, renaming themselves the Black Legion subsequently attacked the c loning facility and destroyed Horus's body and clone[7]. Horus' famous Talon of Horus was taken by Abaddon and is the only part of the Warmaster remaining[Needs Citation].