Xana II - Great Crusade: The Forge World of Xana was a potent and storied example of its kind, an Ultima II-grade faculty rated as one of the most capable Forge Worlds of the Imperium, and unmatched in its region of the galaxy. It comprised a main planetary sphere, Xana II, with a number of inhabited moons and extensive mobile sub-faculties in the form of void and gas mining installations scattered throughout the debris belts and turbulent atmosphere of the macro-magnitude gas giant, Xana I, around which the Forge World orbited as one of its moons.Its position was on the very far tip of the galactic arm of the western fringe, granting it the title on the star charts of the Carta Imperialis as "Occidentem Thule" -- the last great port on the edge of the intergalactic abyss. To the crews of the Imperial fleet whose long range patrols used Xana as their furthest outpost of reach, it bore another more evocative name, "the Port of Bones" -- a reference of uncertain origin, but perhaps developed form the ossuary-white and grey-black livery of its ruling Mechanicum Magi."Xana" had been a word that conjured images of sinister mystery at the edge of the unknown since the earliest days of the Great Crusade. First recorded in rumours taken from the reports of Rogue Traders and exploratory craft sent out towards the western reaches of the galaxy as early as the ninth century of M30, these early "myths" were confused, contradictory and exaggerated in the telling. These tales told of a machine empire that spanned many worlds on one hand and of a lonely outpost -- a forbidden domain which held within it the wonders and terrors of the Dark Age of Technology on the other.Some versions of the rumours held its rulers to be cyborg lords such as the masters of Mars, while others spoke of a nightmarish cabal of dark overminds, fleshless things that should have long been dead. But despite these discrepancies, certain consistencies remained between the iterations of the story; firstly that this technological power was -- or at least had once been -- human and that its home was a star system on the very edge of the western galactic reach upon a world that was time and again named as "Xana."The pursuit of what truth lay behind the myth of Xana became of great interest to the planners and strategists of the early decades of the Great Crusade, not least of all, it is believed, to the Fabricator-General of Mars and the Emperor Himself. To the former, the mysterious data indicated the presence of a powerful and independent Forge World, though one founded perhaps by a lost Ark Mechanicum as no records remained in the vaults of Mars as to an intentional expedition to this desolate and ill-populated region of space.As to the latter's interest, it can only be speculated upon, but it is known that probe ships were sent out into the region by the Emperor's express order. Perhaps it was merely a part of the Master of Mankind's greater interest to see the far-flung domains of humanity united, or perhaps to isolate a rival to be destroyed. It might have been that He saw Xana as a potential location where one of His lost sons might be found; we shall never now know.Deep-range Empyreal explorers and expedition flotillas searched far in their quest for Xana for solar decades, but either did not return or came back empty-handed, save for a fresh handful of rumours and suppositions, and the myth of Xana remained just that, superseded by more pressing conflicts and tangible discoveries which drew away the Great Crusade's attention.The tides of war and conquest would mean that the truth of Xana would remain uncovered until 843.M30 when a damaged galleass belonging to the Rogue Trader Casilida DeAniasie, having been flung far off-course after engaging in battle with Fra'al Corsairs, intercepted a trio of hulking automata warships at the edge of the intergalactic void. Although they might have taken or destroyed her already damaged voidship with little effort, these vessels instead offered aid and carried with them a message of greeting and an offer of diplomatic exchange between the "Sovereign Forge Domain of Xana" and the Imperium of Man and its Emperor.The Xana vessels made good on their intentions by taking the stricken galleass back under tow to the Xana System itself, where it was repaired and resupplied for its journey home with exemplary speed, and the Rogue Trader herself treated with courtesy and honour in a realm that DeAniasie herself would later go on to describe as a "...beacon on the shore of night" -- a fully-fledged Forge World, as potent as any then in the Imperium save mighty Mars itself, set in orbit around a titanic gas giant, itself beholden to a star cast alone on the edge of the great void, without constellation or neighbour for hundreds of light years. A world, if any could be said to be so, on the precipice of the abyss of the unknown.