Valhallan Ice Warriors

The Valhallan Ice Warriors are Astra Militarum (Imperial Guard) regiments raised on the ice world of Valhalla in the Segmentum Ultima, and are counted among the most stubbornly defensive formations fielded by the Imperium of Man. Valhallan troopers are recorded as holding ground against overwhelming odds and absorbing heavy casualties without breaking; regimental tradition holds that they never retreat and never surrender.

Valhalla was once a temperate world before a comet strike, sometimes remembered as the Doom of Valhalla, knocked the planet from its orbit and shattered its climate, forcing the surviving population into vast subterranean cities warmed by the world’s geothermal core. A weakened Ork invasion fleet descended on the planet soon afterwards, and the Valhallans’ hard-won victory in this War of Survival, won despite the loss of much of their stored food, shaped both their military doctrine and their lasting hatred of Ork kind. Service in the Astra Militarum is regarded on Valhalla as an honour and a route out of the crowded, geothermally warmed ice-cities, and Valhallan regiments favour dense defensive formations and massed artillery barrages paired with infantry assault waves; they are issued lasguns, flak armour, and thermally heated coats suited to their homeworld’s cold, with flamers and mortars common among their support weapons.

Valhallan regiments have served across many Imperial campaigns, including the Battle for the Poretta system, the Scouring of Gnosis, the Gravalax Incident, the Battle of Eagle Gate, engagements against Hive Fleet Jormungandr, and the thirteenth Black Crusade. Following the opening of the Great Rift, Valhalla was left stranded within Imperium Nihilus, yet its regiments are recorded as having endured where other worlds fell, and some Valhallan forces answered the call of the Regent of Imperium Nihilus, Dante, to deploy to the Angel’s Halo campaign. Later Valhallan deployments are also associated with the Indomitus and Pariah Crusades, the Argovon Campaign, the War of Beasts on Vigilus, and the Fourth War of Armageddon.

Among the regiment’s notable formations are the Valhallan 597th, commanded by Colonel Regina Kasteen and later associated with Lady General Jenit Sulla, alongside the 18th “Tundra Wolves” and the 1212th “Cold Bloods,” and among its named officers are Commander Kubrik Chenkov and Commander Wladislaw Pietrov. The 597th and other Valhallan units are further remembered for their long association with Commissar Ciaphas Cain, who, though not Valhallan-born, spent much of his career attached to the regiment, and with his aide Gunner Ferik Jurgen, originally of the Valhallan 12th Field Artillery.