Athonos

Athonos is a civilised world of the Segmentum Tempestus whose tithe raises the Athonian Tunnel Rats, Imperial Guard specialists in close-quarters fighting. Its society consists of dozens of rival families, which wage a continuous gang war through the streets and sewers of the planet’s hydroponic gardens.

In the late forty-first millennium, the Necron pirate-king Thaszar awoke beneath the capital city. He raised a tomb ship up through the city, which levelled it. Thaszar did not recognise the human inhabitants as people. He departed the world after destroying an Eldar listening post in orbit.

The environment of Athonos accounts for the character of its regiments. The Athonian Tunnel Rats are trained for combat in hives and mines rather than as line infantry of the kind associated with parade worlds. The Necron awakening remains the principal recorded event in the planet’s history.