EPHRAEL STERN, a Sororitas Miracle | Warhammer 40k Lore
Welcome to the TTP Field Manual’s End-of-Year Special!
In these FINAL DAYS, join Joshy and Jonny as they delve into the characters of Warhammer 40,000, exploring their stories, motivations, and roles in the grim darkness of the far future. Each episode in this series unpacks the "who, what, where, why, and how" of iconic figures, making it the perfect introduction—or reintroduction—for fans old and new.
For Episode #6, we spotlight Ephrael Stern, the Daemonifuge, one of the more controversial and powerful figures in Warhammer 40,000 lore. Dive into her gripping storyline as we uncover her complex origins shaped by heroic deeds and the ever-present influence of the warp. Feared for her immense power, Ephrael battles death, resurrection, and countless trials in a galaxy that distrusts her existence. A unique blend of Adepta Sororitas, Harlequin, and something far greater, she is torn between her sacred duty and the chaos that seeks to consume her. Join us as we unravel the mysteries of Ephrael Stern and her place in the grimdark universe of Warhammer 40,000.
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TTP Field Manual is brought to you by Joshy and Jonny, best friends and gaming enthusiasts from their local group, Trust the Process Hobbies. Die-hard fans of the Warhammer universe, we use this podcast as a platform to share our passionate (and somewhat humorous) ramblings about all things Grimdark.
By day, Joshy is a therapist; by night, he's an RPG aficionado who grew up on (not-so) Final Fantasies and crafting his own Dungeons & Dragons worlds. Jonny, a hospitality manager, spends his downtime conquering more video games than Joshy can keep track of.
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Notes:
- Ephrael Stern, known as the Heretic Saint, is a complex character in Warhammer lore.
- Her narrative spans across a disjointed graphic novel series, leaving much of her story vague.
- Despite her chaotic origins, Ephrael embodies the struggle between good and evil in the Imperium.
- The Screaming Cage, a terrifying construct, plays a pivotal role in Ephrael's resurrection.
- The interplay between Ephrael and her allies highlights themes of trust and betrayal in Warhammer 40k.
Transcript
Hello.
Speaker A:It's the TTP field manual.
Speaker A:It's the Final Days Advent calendar.
Speaker A:It's Joshy, as always.
Speaker A:I'm joined by Johnny.
Speaker A:Hello, Johnny.
Speaker B:Hello.
Speaker A:This episode, if I'm not mistaken, should come out on the classic 25th of December.
Speaker A:Merry Christmas to everybody.
Speaker B:In which time zone?
Speaker A:Australian.
Speaker A:Australian.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:We wanted to have a very fun character for this particular day, so I have chosen the Heretic Saint, Efriel Stern.
Speaker A:Do you have any idea.
Speaker A:Do you have any idea who Efreal Stern is, Jonny?
Speaker B:Not a clue.
Speaker B:Not a clue.
Speaker A:Efriel Stern is an Adepta Sororitas character, but she holds many titles.
Speaker A:Among them does include Heretic Saint.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:So you can sort of see that she doesn't quite fit into that narrative.
Speaker B:Heretic Saint.
Speaker A:Heretic Saint.
Speaker A:It will make sense by the end of this episode.
Speaker B:All right, let's do this then.
Speaker A:Efriel Stern is a very controversial character.
Speaker A:She's controversial within the actual setting, if you couldn't tell already.
Speaker A: at was originally released in: Speaker A:Three years later we had issue two.
Speaker A:Three years later, the third issue.
Speaker A:So three issues across six years, and every single issue changed writers who each sort of applied their own spin to the narrative without too much consideration of what came before.
Speaker A:And so it's a very kind of disjointed, unreliable narrator, pretty over the top storyline, and then the character was left mostly untouched for like 20 years.
Speaker A:IRL.
Speaker B:That sounds terrible.
Speaker A:Kinda.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Oh man.
Speaker B:Just three years between issues and different writers.
Speaker B:That sounds like a really messy affair.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:But it also, to its credit, was in that era of real wacky warhammer.
Speaker A:So it does sort of work as its own thing, but then through the lens of like the current era, it's pretty wacky.
Speaker A:Especially when you consider that despite being a Sororitas in the comic, Ephrael was kind of a rebel.
Speaker A:She was a bit of like the action hero, not too serious, a bit of a flippant attitude.
Speaker A:A bit.
Speaker A:A lot of like the one liner esque behavior.
Speaker A:You know, a chaos person would threaten her and she'll just be like, yeah, puck her up, you know, just not very Sororitas as we know it.
Speaker A:But what do we know about her?
Speaker A:Where she grew up was just, you know, every other kind of day.
Speaker A:Scola Progenum, you know, where various Imperium citizens are essentially raised in boarding school.
Speaker A:And then depending on what they seem to show, you know, specialty in, they go towards whether it's sororitas, the Commissar, the guard, you know, wherever.
Speaker B:Raised from birth to serve the Imperium.
Speaker A:Yeah, basically.
Speaker A:And she was accepted after completing a few different, you know, trials into the Order of Our Martyred Lady.
Speaker A:She, you know, passed her exams, went to the convents of the Sororitas, and was, yeah, accepted into the Order of Our Martyred lady, which is the biggest and most well known order.
Speaker A:It's the black armor with the red capes.
Speaker A:They're the poster scheme of the Sororitas.
Speaker A:And it kind of seems very fitting for Ephrael that she is amongst the Martyred Lady Order.
Speaker A:It is the largest order and they were founded way back in the day in reverence of Saint Catherine the Shield maiden of the Sororitas.
Speaker A:Actual founding woman, Alicia Dominica.
Speaker A:But eventually Catherine would die.
Speaker A:And you see, ever since that moment, all the various conflicts the Martyred lady go through really just galvanizes all the girls further.
Speaker A:They've been in the War of Armageddon, few other big ones, and they just get really galvanized into this culture of martyrdom to the point where some even see their willingness to die for the Emperor as a death wish.
Speaker A:And the.
Speaker A:The Order actually gets a lot of living saints besides St.
Speaker A:Catherine because of this feverish martyrdom and reverence of their leaders.
Speaker A:Saint Celestine is from this Order.
Speaker A:Ephrael Stern is from this Order.
Speaker A:So you can kind of see what we might be getting into today.
Speaker B:I will have faith in your interpretation.
Speaker A:Thank you.
Speaker A:So some of our other episodes have been a bit of a who they are, what they've done here and there and what they're about and what they're going to do.
Speaker A:But Efriel Stern doesn't really have that.
Speaker A:She only has her comic book series and then like a couple of Fluffy mentions in recent years, that isn't much of anything.
Speaker A:So I'm essentially going to give you story time.
Speaker A:We're going to go through part one, two and three of her saga.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:All right, so in part one, we have Ephrael Stern.
Speaker A:She quickly rises through the ranks of the Order of Our Martyred Lady.
Speaker A:She's pretty adept.
Speaker A:She's the Lieutenant Tidus of the Sisters of Battle here.
Speaker A:She gets to the sergeant, like, rank of Prioris.
Speaker A:She is part of the Seraphim, which is the Stormtroopers, the dual wielding jump troops of the Sororitas.
Speaker B:They have sick wings.
Speaker A:They do have sick wings.
Speaker A:And her and about 12,000 sisters would be sent to the world of Parnus.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Now, on Parnus, a sect of the Ordo Pronatus, which is a Sisters civilian order, they are like relic keepers, artifact custodians.
Speaker A:They, you know, go around and collect things and fix things and bring it back to the Imperium.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:One of these Autopronatus sects were presumed lost on the world of Parnas.
Speaker A:Now, for whatever reason, of the 12,000 sisters that went to this world, only Ephrael survived whatever it was that happened on this planet.
Speaker A:And she returned with such limited sanity that she was actually held in a dungeon of her convent world for about four years under suspicion of particular heresy or Chaos tape.
Speaker A:Because how was she the only survivor?
Speaker B:That's a very good question.
Speaker A:Yeah, right.
Speaker A:Four years pass, and she manages to survive an assassination attempt by a sister possessed by Slaanesh while in prison.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker A:There was an Inquisitor as well, that heard of this.
Speaker A:The Inquisitor was named Silas Hand.
Speaker A:Sylas investigated Stern and found no Chaos taint.
Speaker A:Even after the assassination attempt and actually himself reinstated her back into the Sororitas.
Speaker A:She went back to the Seraphim order.
Speaker A:But pretty quickly the pair would decide to work together and they would return with a few more sisters, with some of the Inquisitors, you know, own helpers as well, back to the world of Parnas to understand what had occurred four years prior.
Speaker B:So she doesn't remember?
Speaker A:She does not remember.
Speaker B:Ah, that messed up.
Speaker A:That messed up.
Speaker A:So what happened four years ago is unknown.
Speaker A:Now, when they are nearing the planet, it turns out several of the bridge crew were also possessed by Slaanesh.
Speaker A:This led to a bit of a sabotage of the ship's systems, but it wasn't until the, you know, the party, Ephrael Sylas, couple of their other friend, those managed to actually make planetfall.
Speaker A:Did the flagship actually get destroyed?
Speaker A:Blown up in low orbit from whatever mutiny was occurring on board between the possessed members of the ship and the Loyalists.
Speaker A:But the ship blew up, stranding them on this planet.
Speaker A:Now, upon the planet, they found something that would become known as the Screaming Cage.
Speaker B:That's a terrible sounding place to be.
Speaker A:What do you think the Screaming Cage is, Johnny?
Speaker B:Some sort of torture device?
Speaker A:Yeah, in a sense.
Speaker A:The Screaming Cage.
Speaker A:Now, do you remember that.
Speaker A:That missing Auto Pronatus I mentioned?
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker A:So there was about 700 sisters in that ordo.
Speaker A:They were now the Screaming Cage.
Speaker B:Not a torture device on Parnas.
Speaker A:At the Screaming Cage, which turned out to be a flesh construct of 700 or so fused together Sisters, they explained that they sought to study Slaanesh and also a specific Keeper of Secrets who would then be responsible for their physical binding.
Speaker A:Now, they came at it from a bit of a scholarly point of view.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:They wanted to understand Slaanesh so they could help fight Slaanesh.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:But what ended up happening was that the Keeper of Secrets found them and and quite literally fused them together.
Speaker B:Slaanesh didn't like what they were trying to do.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker A:And four years prior, when Ephrael and the 12,000 Something sisters arrived on Parnas, that Keeper of Secrets had actually influenced the weaker willed sisters of the overall force that Stone was part of.
Speaker A:And when they had arrived, the weaker willed sisters had turned on the Loyalist sisters and they all fought each other to the death.
Speaker A:To the man, to the woman.
Speaker A:But it was the Screaming Cage who actually resurrected Ephrael and helped her to escape.
Speaker A:Because that's 700 people who have begun to understand the Warp.
Speaker A:They've got a bit of a faith based power already.
Speaker A:And because they were sort of 700 people become one, they had a bit more of a psychic power, they had a bit more knowledge, and they were able to telepathically resurrect Ephrael from death and essentially forced her to flee the battlefield.
Speaker A:There's a lot of this idea that Efriel was predestined to have this unique power and do good stuff, and this is really the first indication that she is meant to always be something a little bit more.
Speaker A:Because when learning about all this, that Keeper of Secrets returned and.
Speaker A:And ambushed alongside some of the surviving Heretic sisters, Sylas, Ephrael and their small force.
Speaker A:Together they fought off the demon and the surviving sisters that were corrupted.
Speaker A:And Sylas would actually take his force and chase them into the Warp when they were on the back foot, leaving Ephrael alone with the Screaming Cage, who would psychically impart their collected knowledge regarding Slaanesh as well as their collected psychic power.
Speaker A:Are you with me so far?
Speaker B:So the Screaming Cage has some sort of sentience still.
Speaker B:They're not just like completely bat crazy.
Speaker A:They're not a screaming mound of flesh.
Speaker A:They're just 700 voices all smushed to one.
Speaker B:But they've taken the time to study enough of the Warp and the entity known as Slaanesh.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And now they just like uploaded that all straight into her brain, basically.
Speaker A:In the comic, I think they drew the Screaming Cage as this sort of sphere of flesh with a bunch of faces popping out of it.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:But prior to that, they were all individual scholars and researchers.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So when they were smushed together, instead of going too crazy, they managed to salvage themselves and try and do something good with what had happened to them, which was amp up, Ephrael.
Speaker B:That's a lot of power and knowledge to suddenly be imparted upon one brain.
Speaker A:Oh, yes.
Speaker A:Eel kind of has a problem with losing her memory and then gaining it back because she just has so much in there.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:But that was part one of Ephriel's.
Speaker B:Story, and then we had to wait three years.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:What do you think of.
Speaker A:Of her story so far?
Speaker B:It sounds like a pretty cool little graphic novel.
Speaker A:It is very cool in the sense that so much happens.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Part two is when things go crazy, and then part three is kind of like the denouement, like the taper out.
Speaker B:All right, well, let's get into part two.
Speaker A:Part two, which I believe was called the Lord of Damnation.
Speaker B:Oh, what a name.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:This is when a lot of, like, people and things start happening and appearing.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:Now, part two picks up months later, still on the world of Parnas.
Speaker A:Efriel's still there, and what she has done with her spare time was actually write a compendium of knowledge that she had inherited, the knowledge to sort of oppose and understand Slaanesh, which she would name the Codex Stern.
Speaker A:Now, because months prior, the ship that she and the Inquisitor that ran into the warp arrived upon blew up.
Speaker A:A separate Imperial Voidcraft eventually came to investigate what happened.
Speaker A:Yeah, pretty standard stuff.
Speaker B:Just keep sending people into the abyss.
Speaker A:Keep sending people to partners.
Speaker A:It'll go great.
Speaker B:Yeah, right.
Speaker B:Oh, my God.
Speaker A:The Voidcraft arrived to the planet to investigate the previously destroyed craft.
Speaker A:They managed to actually, you know, rescue Ephrael from the planet.
Speaker A:And it was a pretty standard crusading fleet on board.
Speaker A:You had a cardinal, you had.
Speaker A:You had space Marines of the Black Templars, couple of inquisitors, etc.
Speaker A:But as this ship made its way to a planet, Ephrael was given a vision from her old Inquisitor friend, Sylas Hand, who chased big demon into the warp.
Speaker A:Sylas warned her that the craft was yet another trap of demonic possession.
Speaker B:Oh, no.
Speaker A:And she clued into that pretty quickly.
Speaker A:Several of the marines were possessed, Several of the Inquisitors were possessed, but she actually managed to teleport.
Speaker A:You know, a lot of ships have teleportariums.
Speaker A:She managed to teleport to the surface of the world they were above, and she would, you know, flee the ship, but Inquisitorial agents on the planet itself were ready for anybody, because not only was this the Inquisitorial agents, but it was actually understood by the Inquisition that this ship was possessed.
Speaker A:When Ephrael was fleeing the ship, the Grey Knights managed to actually board the ship and start going to town around about the time that Ephrael disembarked.
Speaker A:But on the planet itself, she was faced with Ordo Malleus Inquisitors who were very much on the idea of, hey, you're probably a possessed, and began to hunt her down across the planet.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:All right.
Speaker A:But she managed to board in relative secrecy, a pilgrim ship, who then left the planet to go somewhere else.
Speaker A:So she was rescued by possessed, the Grey Knights boarded the possessed ship, Ephrael escaped the ship and an escaped Ordomalous.
Speaker B:I see where she's getting the name heretic.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:Now, do you think the story could take more of a turn for the worst?
Speaker B:Oh, there's always room for more when there's Slaanesh around.
Speaker A:What do you think happened to this lovely, inconspicuous pilgrim ship?
Speaker B:It would have been gunned down leaving the planet.
Speaker A:Well, people didn't realise that's the ship she was on.
Speaker A:No, the ship managed to get to the warp and would be captured by Dark Eldar.
Speaker B:Oh, no, not these guys.
Speaker A:For the purposes of the Homunculi.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker B:They're slaves now.
Speaker A:Ephrael would instead, however, be turned into an arena pit fighter, because she obviously looked like she could fight.
Speaker A:The Pilgrims did not.
Speaker B:They became meat for experimentation.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:There was a.
Speaker A:Do you know how the Aeldari call humans monkey?
Speaker A:As this weird tongue in cheek illusion to monkey?
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:It wasn't always monkey that they would say.
Speaker A:It used to be a different word.
Speaker A:You ready for this?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I am.
Speaker A:Kempan ze chimpanzee.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:Chempanze.
Speaker A:A violent, primal creature that the Aeldari heroes of old managed to defeat once upon a time that humans seem to quite resemble.
Speaker B:Interesting.
Speaker A:And Efriel would be known as a pretty capable chempanzee.
Speaker A:She's got that fighting power of like 700 girls, you know?
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:And because she was pretty good at being a pit fighter, the Mandrakes would attempt to assassinate her.
Speaker B:Hey, I know those guys.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So the Mandrakes would attempt to assassinate her, but she would be saved by a harlequin.
Speaker A:A harlequin by the name of Kaiganel or Keeganal Keegals.
Speaker A:I don't know.
Speaker A:I kept calling him Keegals in my brain, but I think his name is Kaiganyl.
Speaker B:There's a lot of Eldar running around in this story.
Speaker A:Oh, yes.
Speaker A:Kai Garnal is the model you would see partnered with her in the tabletop.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:Kai Garnel is her bestie from now until forever.
Speaker A:But Kai Garnel would save her from the Mandrake, save her from the pit fighting, and Kaiganyl actually managed to save her Codex Stern, and then went to her side, basically escorted her out of Commorra into the webway.
Speaker A:Their destination was the Black Library.
Speaker B:Hey.
Speaker A:Because the Black Library would be the safest facility for the knowledge kept within.
Speaker B:The Codex Stern, where no one will ever find it.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:However, unfortunately, they encountered a trap within the webway.
Speaker A:Who do you think designed it?
Speaker B:Probably the Homunculi or Slanush himself.
Speaker B:Sloonoosh can't really get there.
Speaker A:Who really wants to find the Black Library, Johnny?
Speaker A:I'll give you a clue.
Speaker A:It's a Thousand Sun Guy.
Speaker B:Is everyone in this story?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Good old Ahriman.
Speaker A:Good old Ahriman?
Speaker A:Ahriman trapped Ephrael and Kagarnal in the webway, and Ahriman would torture both of them for information on how to access the Black Library.
Speaker A:You know, all Harlequins are based in there, so Qi Garnall should know.
Speaker A:Fortunately, however, Ephrael's bolstered psychic might could resist his efforts long enough for the Grey Knights to once again show up, having been somehow keyed to Ahriman's location.
Speaker B:Oh, they're after him, not after her.
Speaker A:Yeah, so a separate Inquisitor in this story supposedly had.
Speaker A:Supposedly had some kind of Aeldari contacts that.
Speaker A:That were like, hey, Grey Knights, we just got a scoop on Ahriman.
Speaker A:He's headed into the webway to find something.
Speaker A:And so the Grey Knights went for Ahriman.
Speaker A:And what happened was that the Grey Knights are part of Ordo Malleus Demon hunters who, in prior conflict, the Ordomalius marked Ephrael for capture, not kill.
Speaker A:So you ended up with this pretty difficult match because Ahriman was using Efriel as a meat shield.
Speaker A:Was using this poor girl as a meat shield.
Speaker A:Like, she's a bit drugged, she's a bit out of it.
Speaker A:And the Grey Knights were like, nah, we can't kill her.
Speaker A:We need her.
Speaker A:And so is this sort of back and forth, you know, dancing, dancing.
Speaker A:Kaiganal would have to flee, but Ephrael didn't want to be a puppet or, you know, an infamant for either side of this conflict, so she managed to actually steal Ahriman's dagger from his body and kill herself with it.
Speaker A:She drove his dagger right through her own heart and would die for the second time in her life.
Speaker A:Now Ahriman, because he's a little shitter, would escape Qi.
Speaker A:Garnel had fled and the Grey Knights would have no other choice but to flee the battle with her corpse.
Speaker B:Basically empty handed.
Speaker A:Basically empty handed.
Speaker A:So that's part two.
Speaker B:So hold on, where's the book?
Speaker A:Probably with Kai Garnel.
Speaker B:Harlequins always have a game plan and I hate it.
Speaker A:So this was part two.
Speaker A:Stern fled the Slaanesh possessed mob yet again.
Speaker A:She fled the Automalius, only to be captured by Dark Elder, made to fight in Commera, almost was assassinated by Mandrakes, saved by a rogue Harlequin.
Speaker A:And then on their way to the Black Library, they get into a boxing match between Ahriman and the Grey Knights.
Speaker A:Are you keeping up so far?
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker A:What do you think of part two?
Speaker B:I feel like there's a lot of players in play right now and they kind of left it in a bit of a weird spot with the main character being dead and her friend run away.
Speaker A: Yeah, it's given me Big, late: Speaker B:Yeah, I mean, it was then, wasn't it?
Speaker A:We have part three now.
Speaker A:It's a little bit of a denouement in comparison to part two.
Speaker A:It's not as intense, but there's some stuff.
Speaker A:Now, the whole series was always titled Demonifuge, which is a made up term as far as I'm aware.
Speaker A:The third book is figuring out what the Demonifuge is.
Speaker A:So part three opens up with the Grey Knights being called to a world embattled by Nurgle demons and they would have to go there.
Speaker A:They still had Efriel Stern's corpse, but on the planet there was another sister's Ordo.
Speaker A:They're pretty widespread.
Speaker A:They're kind of everywhere.
Speaker A:They're similar in size, like halfway, I should say, between like Guard and Space Marines.
Speaker A:They're just chicks, but they're kind of everywhere.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:So they have a small auto that's pretty, you know, designed, healing the sick and wounded, which is a great place to be.
Speaker A:A Nurgle world.
Speaker B:I feel like that's a terrible place to be.
Speaker B:You'll never get on top of it.
Speaker A:I imagine Nurgle would see that there is an Ordo made for healing the poor and sick and thought, yeah, this is a great place for an invasion.
Speaker A:So on this planet, Ephrael would actually be buried with military honors somehow.
Speaker B:Military honours, yeah.
Speaker A:The Grey Knights just gave her body because what good is a body to the Ordo on the planet?
Speaker A:They buried her.
Speaker A:Done.
Speaker A:But Kaigonal, naturally, was also on the planet and would frequent her grave like a little Watch Guardian.
Speaker A:But he would actually start to see someone or something tampering with her grave and would never be able to figure out what was doing it.
Speaker A:Now that's where that story paused for a bit, because the perspective shifts a bit to another inquisitor named Fazil.
Speaker A:Fazeel was a disciple of old mate Silas Hand, who chased Big Demon into the warp.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker A:Now, Fazil has since been seeking his master's whereabouts.
Speaker A:Naturally, the last known whereabouts of Sylas was with Ephrael Sturm, who has been marked by the Automalus for capture, not.
Speaker B:Kill, but is dead.
Speaker A:Naturally, Fazil believes she's responsible and would seek revenge.
Speaker A:His search would lead him to the planet she was buried on.
Speaker A:But by the time he had got there, months had passed since her actual burial.
Speaker A:And then when he went to investigate her tomb, he found it vacant.
Speaker A:Now guardsmen and other militia on the world would begin to report a white dressed woman appearing across their toughest battlefields, healing and performing miracles.
Speaker A:Pha Z would track her down.
Speaker A:It was indeed Ephrael, but she was quite confused and without much of her memories.
Speaker A:Kaganu would come to her side and he started to call her the Thrice Born.
Speaker A:Because she was born as a normal person, right?
Speaker A:As a baby?
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:She was then resurrected on Parnas by the screaming Cage.
Speaker A:And now she was resurrected once more.
Speaker A:Somehow Nurgle.
Speaker A:And so Thriceborn is one of her few titles.
Speaker A:It could be a nurgle thing, it could be her psychic empowerment, it could be the Emperor's will as a saintly figure.
Speaker A:It could be anything.
Speaker A:Now Kaigonal would come to her side and attempt to escort her to safety.
Speaker A:But at this point, Fazil and his little band would catch up and pretty badly wound Kaganl.
Speaker A:Around about this time, Fazil and his team would, however, be ambushed by nurgle demons, allowing Afriel and Kigarnal to escape across the world.
Speaker A:As they fled, her memories would, bit by bit, return to her, and the knowledge of the cage that she possessed would come to her, and she would begin to accept what she felt was a divine role, something that she would call herself, which was the Demonifuge.
Speaker A:To her understanding, this would be a weapon of light and a scourge of chaos.
Speaker A:And this is what she believed her role to be in the universe.
Speaker A:But her extreme power only Made Fazil more suspicious of her.
Speaker A:Yeah, because witch hunters.
Speaker A:Am I right?
Speaker B:Witchcraft.
Speaker A:A lot of the Ordo Malleus really hate witches.
Speaker A:And anything that doesn't fit neatly into their little box is bad.
Speaker B:Racists.
Speaker A:They're witch racists.
Speaker A:Let's just say them all over again.
Speaker A:Now Fazeel would actually deploy a Culexus assassin against her, which is the freaky one with the skull helmet and the antipsychic field.
Speaker B:Yeah, you're going up against a psyche.
Speaker B:You take the psycho guy, right?
Speaker A:She was so powerful that she actually managed to overload the null field generated by the Kalexis, the thing that turns off psychic power.
Speaker A:She was like.
Speaker A:And then overloaded the Kalexis assassin and defeated it.
Speaker A:Her psychic power was more powerful than his lack of psychic.
Speaker B:That doesn't seem very good.
Speaker A:Nope.
Speaker B:Heresy.
Speaker A:After defeating the Collector, she would actually spare Fazeel.
Speaker A:She would say that Sylas fell in battle against the great enemy and said, don't disrespect your master by being this big douche.
Speaker A:And he's like, yeah, okay.
Speaker A:And as soon as she left, Phyzir would basically not be convinced of her innocence within the matter and vowed in private to forever hunt her down.
Speaker A:And since that day, a lot of Ordo Malleus would really share that opinion.
Speaker A:Now, by this point, Eel's power had just unlocked to be so vast that she, unlike your boy Fabius, did not require a key to activate the Webway.
Speaker A:She could just.
Speaker A:Boop.
Speaker A:There we go.
Speaker B:That seems pretty strong.
Speaker A:It's very strong.
Speaker A:And considering that she has a Harley Quinn who should be very aware of the Webway, both her and Kagarnel ventured forth once again into the Webway in pursuit of the Black Library to safeguard her Codex.
Speaker A:And that's really where the comic series left off.
Speaker A:She disappeared from law for about 20ish years in around the, you know, 8th, 9th, 10th edition campaigns.
Speaker A:There's been, like, name drops.
Speaker A:Like, the heretic Saint was.
Speaker A:Was seen on this battlefield, you know?
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:There's been a little audiobook that's come out that I actually started listening to earlier in the week, and it seems to be a little conflicting with the established canon.
Speaker A:She's very much like a stoic, you know, meditative individual.
Speaker A:Kiganel seems very aloof.
Speaker A:It doesn't really fit.
Speaker A:But what it does showcase is just how powerful she is.
Speaker A:She just.
Speaker A:She flies on command.
Speaker A:She creates like, lightning from her hands on command.
Speaker A:She.
Speaker A:She sees greater demons of Tzeentch and is like, guess what?
Speaker A:I'M just gonna crack the earth apart and smother you with lava.
Speaker A:She's just insanely powerful, but the Inquisition hates her.
Speaker A:Chaos hates her.
Speaker A:Aeldari hate her.
Speaker A:Well, some of them, like Drukhari, hate her.
Speaker A:She's just so powerful.
Speaker A:And she's just this like, two, like, woman and her friend party fighting back against the darkness.
Speaker A:She thought the Imperium was done for when the Great Rift appeared and she was on the other side of it.
Speaker A:And so she just kept going.
Speaker A:She's like, I'm gonna bring humanity together.
Speaker A:I'm gonna save as many people as I can.
Speaker A:And there's all these people that are like, yeah, but I hate you doing that.
Speaker A:And that's her.
Speaker A:That's her whole story, my dude.
Speaker B:So she's a sister's character.
Speaker A:She's a sister's character.
Speaker A:She is a sororitas.
Speaker A:She looks like one, dresses like one, colored like one.
Speaker B:But she can't lead sisters.
Speaker A:So here's the thing.
Speaker A:There are several autos of the sisters that are, like, happy to see her come and help.
Speaker A:There's also some that are like, you don't really fit in our neat little box, babe.
Speaker A:But by the time anyone comes around to deal with her, she's already gone.
Speaker A:She's fled.
Speaker A:She's fled the battle.
Speaker A:She's off to the next conflict.
Speaker A:She's this psychic saintly entity, much like Celestine is, who just appears, saves a bunch of people, pieces out.
Speaker B:Interesting.
Speaker A:Okay, and unlike our other characters, we're not missing anything here.
Speaker A:That's literally all of her lore.
Speaker A:That's every single bit of it, with maybe a couple of names lost here and there, but that's it.
Speaker A:That's her whole, whole lore.
Speaker A:She's the Christmas miracle of the sororitas.
Speaker A:So I thought that would make for a neat little Christmas aligned episode.
Speaker B:That's cool.
Speaker A:What do you think of Ephrael?
Speaker B:She's kind of a badass.
Speaker A:She's such a badass, but at the.
Speaker B:Same time, I'm so confused by how everyone hates her just because she's strong, she doesn't fit, and everything she does, she's just like, I'm one of you guys.
Speaker B:And they're like, but are you?
Speaker A:You know, she's like a demigod wearing the face of a Sister of Battle.
Speaker A:She has a Harley Quinn for a best friend.
Speaker A:She's escaped Ahriman.
Speaker A:She's escaped demons.
Speaker A:She's fought, you know, several Slaanesh possessed and survived.
Speaker A:And she's fine.
Speaker A:She's been brushed up against so much bad stuff that people just can't believe she's all good, you know?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And it doesn't help that she's running around with Xenos.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:We know how the Imperium feel about Zenos.
Speaker B:My big issue is, like, what is the Harlequin's game plan?
Speaker B:Because everything I know about them, there's always a game plan.
Speaker A:Well, Kagarnel only appears in Ephrael's story, and from what I can gather, Kagarnal is somewhat of an outcast from the Harlequins as a whole.
Speaker A:He's done something or he believes something that goes against what they want.
Speaker B:It goes against the story.
Speaker A:So he's sort of a rogue agent of the Harlequins.
Speaker B:So he's not a Harlequin, he's just an Aeldari.
Speaker A:Essentially, he's a Harlequin outcast.
Speaker B:Interesting.
Speaker A:Like, he would have studied with the Harley Quinns.
Speaker A:He probably knows where the Black Library technically is.
Speaker A:It just takes a while to find.
Speaker B:It, especially when you're getting interrupted by Greynot.
Speaker A:He talks like one, he moves like one.
Speaker A:You know, he's acrobatic, he's finesse, he's a shimmering blur on the battlefield.
Speaker A:He is, for all intents and purposes, a Harley Quinn, just not culturally.
Speaker B:Okay, all right.
Speaker A:But that's Sephriel.
Speaker A:Definitely a bit of exposition dump for you, but that's really how I can only explain her to you.
Speaker B:No, that's fine.
Speaker B:It's an interesting character, and it just goes to show just how many interesting characters there are in this universe.
Speaker A:I really can't wait for her to come back in a meaningful way.
Speaker A:But I'm not sure how that's going to actually occur.
Speaker A:But her book got re released as a 20th anniversary, and she got a model alongside her and Kagano as a two person character unit.
Speaker A:They are, I would say, very strong at 85 points.
Speaker A:They have very high movement at 8 inches.
Speaker A:They have both a 4up invulnerable save, so like half a chance to shrug damage.
Speaker A:And they have a pretty sizable eight wounds between the two of them.
Speaker A:You could, you know, allocate damage to Kagano before Stern, so she's got a little meat shield that's pretty cool.
Speaker A:Together.
Speaker A:Not only do they deep strike, but they have lone operative and they fight first.
Speaker B:Oh, that's terrifying.
Speaker A:Their melee profiles excel at precision attacking characters.
Speaker A:Both of them have precision keyworded weapons, so they go straight for the throat.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:And Ephrael's melee weapon named Sanctity even has an anti chaos 2up keyword.
Speaker A:So she's almost guaranteed to take down.
Speaker B:Chaos characters, which is absolutely terrifying to the guy who plays only Chaos, for sure.
Speaker A:Now, they do have a couple of abilities.
Speaker A:Pretty basic though.
Speaker A:Their appeals, really.
Speaker A:In their stat sheet, they can be targeted for free with heroic intervention.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:And in the shooting phase, Ephrael can pick a unit within 12 inches of her.
Speaker A:If they are Chaos, they do a battle shock test at minus two.
Speaker A:And if they fail, they get dealt three mortal wounds.
Speaker B:That's really good.
Speaker A:She Palpatine Lightning strikes.
Speaker B:But only Chaos.
Speaker A:Only Chaos.
Speaker A:She's a fringe pick.
Speaker B:She's your tie in when you think Chaos is going to take the meta.
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker A:And I think even without the Chaos component, she and Kagano work really well in the boarding actions because of how just strong they are.
Speaker B:Wait, that boarding action's legal?
Speaker A:Yep.
Speaker B:That's pretty cool.
Speaker A:I will likely take them for boarding actions as a leader.
Speaker B:Nah, that sounds terrible.
Speaker B:Wait, leader?
Speaker B:They're loan up.
Speaker A:Well, not like Warlord.
Speaker B:Oh, okay.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:They are quite strong for the size of boarding actions.
Speaker A:A lot of Sisters characters are not.
Speaker B:That's pretty cool.
Speaker A:But that's Efriel Stern in her quite literal entirety.
Speaker A:What you think?
Speaker B:I think she's a pretty cool chick with one of the angriest face models I've seen in a while.
Speaker A:Yeah, right.
Speaker B:Such angry face.
Speaker B:And Keeganal is a pretty cool looking dude just on his own.
Speaker A:Yeah, right.
Speaker A:It's actually, funnily enough, fun fact.
Speaker A:Kirganl is the only named Harley Quinn model model.
Speaker A:Okay, yep, yep, there are Harlequin characters, but there's no Solandri Vale Walker.
Speaker A:There's no other person.
Speaker A:It's just Kirgan.
Speaker B:Do not say that name to me.
Speaker A:It's just Kaganl as a character.
Speaker B:And it's not even in the Aeldari Codex.
Speaker A:No, no.
Speaker A:But yeah, that's her.
Speaker A:That is Efriel Stern.
Speaker A:The Demonifuge, the Thriceborn, the Heretic Saint, the sister who seemed to have always been predestined for greatness.
Speaker A:And now no one wants to be her friend except for a harlequin.
Speaker A:Nice, dude, Nice.
Speaker A:Well, Jonny, I'll catch you and the listeners tomorrow for yet another of our little Final Day character vignettes.
Speaker B:I look forward to it.
Speaker A:Stay tuned.
