Commander Farsight - The Great Decree: In consultation with his Ethereal advisors, Farsight once more respectfully requested reinforcement from Vior'la. The war hung in the balance, he claimed; a determined assault on key Ork positions could see the course of the entire campaign end in favour of the T'au. There was a lengthy silence before the Ethereals replied that a T'au ship from Vior'la was indeed inbound. They would say no more on the matter. When a lone Orca dropship descended upon Arkunasha, Farsight and his closest advisors met it in person atop a massive natural plateau in the Argap Highlands. When the large ramp opened at the Orca's fore, and the promised reinforcements stepped out -- two ceremonial honour guards and a single Ethereal. Farsight did well to choke down the surprise and frustration that rose in his chest. A single Ethereal -- their presence was good for morale, to be sure, but they could hardly be counted a concrete asset, and certainly not the auxiliary Hunter Cadres that O'Shovah had been hoping for. He turned to his own Ethereal advisors in dismay, but held his tongue. It was well that he did, for his actions were being monitored very closely indeed.The newcomer introduced himself as Aun'Shi of Vior'la. He was a veteran of scores of battles -- his many scars attested to that -- and he carried himself with the surety of a warrior lord. The Ethereal calmly explained that over the next few years, the Fire Caste were to withdraw entirely from Arkunasha, taking as many of the planet's colonists with them as they could. He would oversee the extraction personally. There would be no more attacks, no more killing blows -- only defence. The plateau upon which they stood would be their fortress, and they would protect it with every iota of their being until every living T'au had left the planet. This they would do for the Greater Good, effective immediately. Farsight nodded curtly at the news and bowed low in obeisance. In a secret part of his soul, however, he felt a great disquiet stir. Nevertheless, a senior Ethereal had spoken. A simple commander could not hope to appreciate the full scale of the High Council's plans.Over the course of the next year, Farsight enacted the Ethereal council's plans to the letter. Consolidating the civilian T'au into a series of hastily-constructed bio-domes atop the Argap Plateau, he defended the natural fortress with every weapon and strategy at his disposal. Though he lost thousands of good soldiers in the process, he further whittled down the numbers of the Waaagh! that had by now converged upon his position. In the process, he continued to attack their command structure, prioritising the deaths of mechanics, medics, and warrior-leaders until there were no more left amongst them. In their haste to make war, the Orks that had encircled the plateau relentlessly ground themselves into its defences until the valleys below were choked with corpses. Not one of them had the vision or perspective to retreat, and Farsight pitilessly exterminated any who broke through his cordons. Many of Commander Farsight's pupils, Brightsword most strident amongst them, called for revenge for the fallen. They proposed a final push to exterminate the aliens once and for all before extraction. O'Shovah sombrely argued against this course of action. So it was that the T'au colonists were evacuated from Arkunasha, and the Fire Caste along with them.The Fire Caste returned to Arkunasha the next year. With the exhaustive cartographic information harnessed by Farsight's Warscaper Drones, and with the Book of the Beast to guide them, they made short work of the Orks left there. The Waaagh! had effectively already been broken at Argap Plateau, reduced to less than a hundredth of the size it had been when it first reached the planet's red sands. The T'au's Hunter Cadres cleansed and reclaimed the planet in the space of less than a year, reinstalling the colonists dome by dome as the Earth Caste brought the conurbations back to a functional state. Soon, the planet glittered like a jewel amongst the stars once more, but Commander Farsight was not there to witness it; his destiny lay elsewhere. The T'au had been assailed by a new foe -- the Imperium of Man.