Battle of Biel-Tan

The Battle of Biel-Tan was a conflict fought between the Aeldari of Craftworld Biel-Tan, the Ynnari and the forces of Chaos in the closing days of the 41st Millennium.

It resulted in the first major victory of the Ynnari faction and the birth of the Avatar of the Aeldari god of the dead Ynnead, known as the Yncarne.

As the 13th Black Crusade of Abaddon the Despoiler raged across the rest of the galaxy, a new sect of Aeldari known as the Ynnari emerged. Led by Yvraine, the Daughter of Shade and prophet of the Aeldari god of the dead Ynnead, they had first emerged in the Drukhari city of Commorragh during the event known as the Night of Revelations.

The Ynnari sought to resurrect Ynnead without having to sacrifice the entirety of the Aeldari species as most legends had claimed would be required for the god of the dead's birth.

The Ruinous Powers were alarmed by this development and sought to foil the rebirth of Ynnead at all costs. They key to the Ynnari's plans was the recovery of the mythic Aeldari artefacts called the Croneswords, several of which were located on Craftworld Biel-Tan. Thus both the Ynnari and Chaos forces sought entry into the Craftworld to claim these relics.

A Webway portal onto Biel-tan was discovered by the forces of Chaos on the Maiden World of Ursulia, and it was there that they made their move.

A massive Warp Storm ravaged the Maiden World, decimating its population of Exodites and transforming it into a Daemon World before the Herald of Slaanesh and Daemonette called The Masque of Slaanesh and the Bloodthirster Skarbrand led an invasion of Slaaneshi and Khornate daemons.

Skarbrand cared little for his Slaaneshi allies and initially tried to slay the Masque, but she was able to convince the Bloodthirster to agree to a temporary alliance. Biel-Tan, unaware of the larger machinations of the Chaos forces, nonetheless sent a sizable expedition to Ursulia in order to defend what they beleived to be one of the precious Maiden Worlds of the Aeldari.

The counterattack was led by Biel-Tan's Autarch Meliniel and a massive battle erupted on Ursulia's surface. At the battle's height, the Webway portal that led to Biel-Tan was smashed open by Skarbrand's axe, allowing the Masque to pass through to reach the world-ship beyond.

Descending from the Webway portal at the stern of Biel-Tan to drift down like a pearl diver heading for the sea bed, the Masque made it to the surface of the world-ship.

The quiet Chaos infiltration ended when Skarbrand and his Khornate legions smashed through Biel-Tan's Webway portal and a vicious combat erupted aboard the craftworld.

The Avatar of Biel-Tan was awoken and clashed with Skarbrand personally while the Phoenix Lord Jain Zar and a force of Howling Banshees Aspect Warriors attempted to subdue the Masque before she could summon ever more daemons. Despite Jain-Zar besting the Masque in combat, the daemon proved able to enter Biel-Tan's Infinity Circuit in an attempt to destroy the Craftworld's very soul.

From there she polluted the craftworld's Infinity Circuit with Slaaneshi daemons in such number that the innate defences of that wraithbone megastructure were hard-pressed to cope. Slowly, the Biel-Tan Infinity Circuit became corrupted as it was possessed by the very daemonic forces it was devised to help the Asuryani within it escape.

Even as the Biel-Tani fought with every ounce of their skill to quarantine and cleanse their home of the daemon infestation, the Ynnari passed through the Webway to join forces with them, led by Yvraine and Eldrad Ulthran.

Consisting primarily of Harlequins and Drukhari who had accepted the worship of Ynnead, the Ynnari were able to turn the tide of the battle. Skarbrand and his hordes were ultimately destroyed or forced back into the Webway.

Yvraine, under attack from a horde of daemonettes, breathed out a cold grey mist that dissolved them amongst a horrible keening scream. The parlay between Ynnari and Biel-Tani was strained, due to the the hated Drukhari among them. The presence of Jain Zar, who spoke out on Yvraine's behalf, bought enough time for the high priestess of Ynnead to perform a ritual of her own.

Yvraine plunged her hand into the psychoplastic wraithbone skeleton of the Biel-Tan world-ship as if it offered no more resistance than water. When she drew it back out, she held high the second of the Croneswords that had been buried in the craftworld's spine for many Terran millennia.

The Biel-Tani Infinity Circuit, already wracked with pain, began to shatter, and the backlash of deathly psychic energies formed a vortex of terrifying power.

From that vortex emerged the Yncarne, the Avatar of the Aeldari god of the dead. Its coalescence has a terrible price, however -- though Biel-Tan's Infinity Circuit was cleansed of daemons by Ynnead's power, the craftworld began to physically break apart.

Worse still, roiling storms of psychic energy boiled through the void, joining with the empyric dissonance of several other cataclysmic events such as the destruction of Cadia during the 13th Black Crusade to form a large section of the Great Rift.

Biel-Tan was saved though it would need solar decades to recover, but the galaxy itself had paid the price.

The Seers of Craftworld Ulthwé then opened a portal from their Dome of Crystal Seers to its equivalent upon Biel-Tan, destroying the precious and irreplaceable souls of several deceased Farseers within the Ulthwé Infinity Circuit to do so.

The sacrifice was deemed necessary to ensure the Ynnari were rescued from damaged Biel-Tan before the strife they had sown among its populace saw the craftworld consumed in the fires of civil war between those who accepted Ynnead's message and those enraged by the damage the Ynnari had done to their home.

The Ynnari then continued on the next stage of their quest to recover the Croneswords and unite the Aeldari species against its Archenemy.