Loyalists gain ground on Palantir

Unaware of the issues at Boltarean, the Imperial explorator fleet continued on, next finding the system of Palantir. Ancient star charts suggested Palantir was a human settlement, but there had been no contact with the system for centuries. 

The loyalists landed on the outer world finding it to be relatively homely. Although the world was mostly a global ocean, the landscape of the small landmass on the western hemisphere was dominated by grassy moorland and populated by stunted abhumans. Although initially repulsed at the sight of these tiny people, the loyalists eventually agreed (after several enforced autopsies by the Mechanicum Biologis) that they were of acceptable levels of mutation. The world was christened "Hobbiton" and claimed for the Emperor, and the small human settlements were immediately incorporated into the new founding of the "Hadron Subsector".

The abhumans also told the Imperial forces they were not alone on the world, and they had been fighting an endless war against greenskinned monsters for centuries. Recognising the ork xenos, the loyalist force, led by the Lycaon Guard quickly penetrated the difficult terrain of the western uplands, although they found the going tough due to the tangled undergrowth. In the western heights they found a significant number of orks.

The greenskins - mostly boyz without much in the way of equipment, charged at the Lycaons, but were in turn hampered by the tussock grass and bogs covering the wet moorland. This gave the imperial force ample time to simply mow down the Xenos, and the battle of the uplands soon became a massacre. Returning triumphant to the abhuman villages, the new arrivals were hailed as saviours, and Hobbiton willingly re-joined the Imperium of Mankind.