Cormac Bloodaxe was a Champion of Khorne, the Chaos God of war and murder, and a fearsome chieftain and high king amongst the ancient Norsii tribes. He was sacrificed to Khorne to become the physical vessel for a Bloodthirster Daemon who battled Sigmar during a Norsii assault on Middenheim and was ultimately defeated by the first emperor.
History[]
The son of the slain Norsii High King Varag Skulltaker, Cormac Bloodaxe harboured a soul-blackening hatred towards the newly ascendant Empire that had slaughtered and driven his people back to the barren northlands. His greatest resentment was reserved for the Unberogens and their king Sigmar Heldenhammer, who had led the charge against the Northern tribes. The molten core of violence within him, as well as his favour in the eyes of the Blood God, proved a potent force in unifying the scattered tribes of the Norsii; clad in his father's Chaos Armour and wielding a burning axe in which was bound the spirit of a Daemon of Khorne, he was an avenging fury that laid waste to the enemies of his people.[1]
In time, tales of Cormac's victories and strength reached to the eastern lands, drawing the Kurgan and Hung tribes to pledge their lives to his banner. In the year 9 IC, he led the Norsii wolfships to ravage the coastal regions of the Udoses tribe, before putting the town of Haugrvik to the torch and slaying all within as a sacrifice to Khorne. Cormac then led the Norsii to the Udoses capital and destroyed the castle of Salzenhus, personally slaying Wolfila, chieftain of the Udoses, and crucifying him. The Norsii armies then marched unimpeded through the outlying Imperial territories, putting countless townships to the torch.[1]
When the emperor finally marshalled the tribes to face them, his army fared no better, and was forced to retreat to the city of Middenheim. The Norsii followed the battered remnants of Sigmar's army, intending to slay the emperor and corrupt the sacred Flame of Ulric, thus destroying the faith of the Empire itself.[1]
The siege itself lasted over a dozen days. On the thirteenth, most terrible day of the siege, Cormac Bloodaxe, who had slain so many in battle that his axe now perpetually ran thick with congealed blood, awoke knowing the will of his god was to be carried out. For his veins throbbed and his vision streaked with red, as though an endless gourd of blood was being poured over his head. His shaman, Kar Odacen, had a great pit where the Norsii had thrown the corpses of their enemies in honour of Khorne, and there did Cormac command the greatest warriors of eight clans to sacrifice themselves to Khorne's glory. However, the warlord had been deceived. The shaman told Cormac his role was to fight alongside a Lord of Khorne. In truth, he was to become one.[1a]
Cormac's body and soul were ripped apart, to serve as the host for a creature older than time and more terrible than nightmare -- a Bloodthirster of Khorne. It took every scrap of Kar Odacen's power to summon such a mighty Daemonic champion of the Blood God, and the shaman had been forced to bind his life-force to it to seal the pact. However, the results were undeniable. The runes the Dwarf runesmith Alaric the Mad had carved into Middenheim to stave off the Norsemen's sorceries disintegrated from its mere existence, the Men of the Empire wept and vomited blood, and those who had only moments before been fighting like heroes of legend fled from the monstrous shadow that filled the sky with its bulk.[1a][1b]
The Greater Daemon cared not for the lesser mortals fighting the Norsii, and flew directly to the centre of the city -- to the Flame of Ulric -- to confront Sigmar. The Norsii roared their exultation to the cold thrones of the gods, their cries now even more hideously animalistic than those of the Beastmen who stood alongside them, and they fought with fury so redoubled that none could withstand them -- such was their joy to fight under the gaze of a living avatar of Khorne the Mighty.[1b]
Of the one-hundred warriors who stood with Sigmar, fully a third dropped dead from terror at the sight of the abomination that landed in their midst. Others fled in terror, leaving only a staunch few able to overcome their fear. Like the darkest desires of men and beasts knitted together in a nightmare, it was a creature of darkness dragged into the light by dreams of blood.[1b]
It stood four times the height of a man on back-jointed legs, its body vast and muscled. Sheathed in bronze and iron, its flesh was the brutal colour of charred corpses, and the stink of the grave was pressed into its wiry fur. The blunt wedge of its horned head was filled with serrated fangs, and its eyes were like holes pierced in the flank of a volcano. Enormous wings of smoking darkness spread out behind it, and flagstones shattered as its enormous weight landed. It clutched a bronze axe in one meaty fist and a writhing whip like a cat-o'-nine-tails in the other. The ends of the barbed whip's lashes ended in wailing skulls that dripped blood from their empty eye sockets.[1b]
It was only through the aid of Myrsa, Warrior Eternal of the Fauschlag and the greatest champion of the Teutogens, and the divine power of Ulric himself, that Sigmar was able to marshall enough strength to defeat his foe, banishing the Daemon to the Realm of Chaos. With its defeat, the morale of the Norsii army gave out, and they now fought their way past the vengeful press of Imperials to reach their wolfships and return to their new homeland. Though the Empire was ultimately victorious, the dreadful memory of how close it had come to desolation loomed long in the memories of all who had fought and suffered in the invasion; and few would ever forget the terror of the mighty Norsemen.[1]
Legacy[]
Cormac's Flaming Daemonaxe became a powerful artefact amongst later Norscan chieftains, and would be wielded by uncounted numbers of mighty Chaos Champions of the Dark Gods. [2]
Canon Conflict[]
There is an inconsistency in the timeline as to when Cormac Bloodaxe first launched his invasion of the Empire. The Time of Legends novel God King by Graham McNeill mentions that a Norscan king named Cormac Bloodaxe was the one who led a Chaos invasion into the lands of the Empire sometime soon after Sigmar's coronation as the first emperor. However, in the 4th Edition Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Rulebook, on page 272, the timeline states that it was not Cormac Bloodaxe but the first Everchosen Morkar the Uniter who launched his invasion in 1 IC.[3a]
This statement, made in the most current canon source, would contradict the events of that novel as well as the other Time of Legends novel in which Cormac appears, Empire by Graham McNeill, as when God King introduced Morkar, he was only a child and the razing of his village by Sigmar's forces occurred just after the siege of Middenheim by Cormac Bloodaxe.