Great Purge

The Great Purge was a planet-wide culling carried out by the Viltrum Empire under Thragg's authority following Argall's assassination on Viltrum. It systematically eliminated everyone judged weak or ideologically unfit, intended to stabilize and consolidate Viltrumite society, and it cemented the Thragg Era while ushering in a far more rigid, militaristic order.

After Thaedus assassinated Argall and the emperor's heirs went missing, the Viltrumites fell into instability overseen by the Viltrumite Council, which appointed Argall's second-in-command, Thragg, as Grand Regent. During Argall's wake, Thragg ignited a civil war to root out the weakness that had allowed such betrayal. He killed a councilor and ordered those present to do the same, sparking a brutal free-for-all in which Viltrumites, even children, fought and slew one another to prove their strength. Corpses piled in the streets over an uncertain span until the population had fallen by nearly half, leaving a hardened warrior race behind. Surveying the carnage, Thragg came upon three survivors, Conquest, Thula, and Kregg, declared the fighting over, and coldly forced Conquest and Thula to stand down.

With the culling complete, Thragg addressed his remaining people, proclaiming that their cities would be rebuilt no longer on the blood of the weak and that they would now carry on Argall's legacy by expanding the empire, closing with the creed that all would be theirs. The purge left the Viltrumites far more unified and militarized, tightened Thragg's grip as supreme leader, and stood as a defining turning point that hardened the empire's dominance across the universe.