The Amanoa Funeral Incident unfolded during the Freedon Nadd Uprising around 3998 BBY. During this time, the army of dark side adherents, under the command of King Ommin of Iziz, launched an assault. Their target was the combined forces of the Jedi Order and the Beast Riders of Onderon, who were participating in the funeral procession for Ommin's deceased wife, the Sith sorceress Queen Amanoa. A group of Jedi Knights, guided by Jedi Master Arca Jeth, were preparing to move both Amanoa's sarcophagus and that of the ancient Dark Lord Freedon Nadd to a newly built mausoleum situated across Onderon's jungle moon, Dxun.
As the procession for Amanoa took place, a colossal groundborer surfaced from beneath the ground, revealing a darksiders army commanded by the Dark Jedi Warb Null. This army successfully reclaimed the coffins and retreated with them on their war machine into the subterranean levels of the city of Iziz. It was suspected that Amanoa's husband, the sorcerer King Ommin, was residing there. Arca Jeth, Jedi Knight Ulic Qel-Droma, and Amanoa's daughter, Galia, pursued the borer into the tunnels. They discovered that Ommin, who had been presumed dead by the general population of Onderon, was indeed alive and allied with the spirit of Freedon Nadd.
Acting on Nadd's instructions, Jeth was captured and taken deeper into the tunnels following a brief encounter with Ommin and his Sith master. While Qel-Droma and Galia attempted to escape, Warb Null confronted them, but the Jedi Knight swiftly defeated him. They then returned to the surface, where Qel-Droma, recognizing the need for reinforcements, sent a distress signal to the Galactic Republic, requesting assistance.
For nearly four centuries, the Inner Rim world of Onderon had been consumed by a civil conflict between the dark side-worshiping inhabitants of the only established city, Iziz, and the Beast Riders from the planet's wilderness. The Jedi Order intervened in the final battle, dispatching Jedi Knights Cay and Ulic Qel-Droma, along with the Twi'lek Jedi Tott Doneeta, to mediate the unrest. The Knights' efforts to broker a peaceful resolution between Beast-Lord Oron Kira and the ruler of Iziz, Queen Amanoa, were unsuccessful. Consequently, their mission escalated into a full-scale battle. The conflict only ended after the arrival of their Master, the Arkanian Jedi Arca Jeth, who employed his Jedi battle meditation skills to shift the battle's momentum. As a final act, Jeth and his Jedi confronted Amanoa, who had been secretly harnessing the power of the Dark Lord of the Sith Freedon Nadd in his tomb beneath the royal palace of Iziz. Jeth used the Force to cast out the darkness of Nadd's tomb with light, and without the Dark Lord's influence, Amanoa's power waned. She passed away in her daughter's arms, unwilling to embrace the light.
With Amanoa's death, Iziz was left without a rightful ruler. Following the traditions of the Onderon Royal Family, Amanoa's daughter, Galia, ascended to the throne, and she and her new husband, Oron Kira, became the new King and Queen of Onderon. They immediately began preparations to bury Amanoa and Freedon Nadd, whose remains had been seized by the Jedi after Amanoa's death. A funeral was organized under Arca Jeth's guidance, who remained concerned about the potent darkness emanating from the coffin. To prevent the dark side power of Nadd's sarcophagus from further affecting the citizens of Onderon, Jeth ordered the construction of a new tomb made of Mandalorian iron on Dxun, the planet's jungle moon. Amanoa would also be laid to rest there.
Meanwhile, the Jedi tasked Oron Kira's second-in-command, Gobee, and another Beast Rider with searching the catacombs beneath Iziz, where rumors persisted of Sith magic practitioners lurking in the depths. After traversing miles of tunnels, Gobee and his companion encountered King Ommin himself. Gobee and the other Beast Rider interrupted the Queen's procession when they emerged from the tunnels just before an attack, but they were unable to warn their fellow Beast Riders and the Jedi before a massive boring machine disrupted them. The war engine emerged from beneath Iziz, releasing numerous Naddist soldiers. Leading them was a colossal lightsaber-wielding Dark Jedi whose armor radiated with Sith magic.
Oron Kira and his men immediately engaged the Naddists as they exited their war machine, while the Knights confronted the Dark Jedi, who identified himself as Warb Null. Before Arca Jeth could join the battle, he was suddenly attacked through the Force by an unknown adversary and rendered incapacitated. Null's battle with the Jedi provided a diversion for his Naddist soldiers, who were tasked with recapturing the sarcophagi of Nadd and Amanoa and loading them onto the war machine. After completing their mission, Null ordered a retreat; the tunnel-maker retreated and descended into the depths, with the Dark Jedi following closely. Ulic Qel-Droma pursued them, grabbing onto the tunnel-maker and demanding that the armored Null return and face him. However, Null did not emerge, and Qel-Droma was nearly pulled into the gaping hole left behind by the war machine. He jumped off the machine in time to avoid falling in the hole and rejoined his comrades as they tended to the fallen Arca Jeth. Meanwhile, Tott Doneeta received a message that another contingent of the darksider army was approaching the city.
Jeth had barely recovered from the dark side attack when he realized that the Naddists were only distracting the Jedi; their true intention was to recover the sarcophagi of Amanoa and Freedon Nadd. Jeth deduced that Nadd's coffin was the source of the dark power plaguing Onderon and that retrieving it along with Amanoa's was the only solution. Galia then revealed that her father, Ommin, was still alive and that he might be the Jedi's only hope of recovering the sarcophagi. Tott Doneeta, Oss Wilum, and Cay Qel-Droma remained behind with Oron Kira, while Arca Jeth and Ulic Qel-Droma planned to follow the war machine's exit-tunnel in hopes of confronting the darksiders. Galia insisted on accompanying them due to her familiarity with the catacombs. The trio descended into the darkness of the tunnels, determined to find the darksiders, the sarcophagi, and possibly even King Ommin.
As they ventured deeper underground, Galia realized that she was less familiar with the catacombs than she had initially believed. However, Jeth sensed the dark side's potency growing stronger, confirming that they were heading in the right direction. Ulic Qel-Droma was more focused on confronting Warb Null than on their destination or finding the King. Before long, the trio encountered King Ommin himself, who was being physically supported by a full-body, durasteel exoskeleton. Ommin explained that the support-frame was necessary to aid his movements, but Jeth sensed a darker power at play. Ommin beckoned him closer as he revealed his allegiance to the spirit of Freedon Nadd, whom he had summoned from Chaos. Freedon Nadd then appeared behind Ommin, empowering him with the dark side of the Force.
Arca Jeth immediately confronted Nadd but was intercepted by Ommin, who seized Jeth's throat and began smothering him with waves of dark side energy. Jeth was incapacitated, and Qel-Droma attempted to rescue him but was unable to penetrate the energy field surrounding Jeth. Ommin then revealed his Dark Side Army: fully armed, battle-ready, and led by the armor-clad Warb Null. With the Dark Jedi at his side, the King attempted to seduce Galia to the dark side. His daughter promptly refused, expressing her desire to escape. Qel-Droma, however, succumbed to his desire for revenge; he fought his way through Ommin's warriors to Warb Null. As the King and Freedon Nadd descended into the depths with a subdued Jeth, Qel-Droma engaged the armored darksider in lightsaber combat.
Qel-Droma and Null's duel was brief but intense, and Null was overpowered by the enraged Jedi. Qel-Droma parried several blows before dodging an overhand slash and flipping over Null, gaining the upper hand. Qel-Droma instantly attacked, severing Null's weapon arm, leaving him defeated, humbled, and begging for amnesty. Qel-Droma ignored his pleas, brought his lightsaber around, and beheaded the Dark Jedi. Unbeknownst to him, Nadd had planned Null's death, viewing the duel as a test of the young Jedi's growing dark side power.
Qel-Droma then realized that he had abandoned both Galia and Jeth, the latter of whom had been kidnapped by Ommin and Nadd during the duel. In their place was Ommin's Dark Side Army, blocking their path to the tunnel where Ommin had departed. Realizing that he was no match for an entire army of Sith magic-empowered warriors, Qel-Droma quickly fled with Galia through the tunnels toward the surface.
Galia and Qel-Droma emerged above ground to find that the Royal Palace and the city had been retaken by the Naddists. They wandered the war-torn streets of Iziz until they encountered Cay Qel-Droma, Oss Wilum, and Oron Kira. Ulic Qel-Droma explained that Jeth had been kidnapped and that another of Ommin's dark side militias was approaching to join the battle. They decided that Galia would be taken to safety, while the Jedi and Oron Kira would take command from the Beast Rider stronghold, Fortress Kira. Ulic Qel-Droma knew that the situation had escalated beyond his and his current forces' capabilities. Therefore, his only option was to send a message to the Jedi Order and the Galactic Senate on Coruscant, hoping that they would dispatch reinforcements.
Qel-Droma's message was received and debated by the Republic Ministry of Defense, which decided to send the entire Republic Navy to defend Onderon. The Jedi also acknowledged the call for aid and responded by sending five Knights to assist them. One of the chosen Jedi, a young woman named Nomi Sunrider, was also selected to lead the Republic Fleet into battle. However, Qel-Droma and his companions on Onderon were unaware of these developments, leaving them with only hope to rely on.
The battle during the funeral first appeared in Freedon Nadd Uprising 1 of the Tales of the Jedi comic series. The battle was created and written by Tom Veitch and drawn by Tony Akins. Veitch and Kevin J. Anderson used the events portrayed in this battle and the following battle as background details for their joint project Dark Lords of the Sith, where characters like Ulic and Cay Qel-Droma were explored in depth while playing integral roles in the storyline. The battle also provided a backdrop for the Krath Holy Crusade, which was written as part of the larger Great Sith War. It was later recounted in the Tales of the Jedi audio drama, written by John Whitman and based on Veitch's original script.
In the original comic, Queen Galia is reunited with Oron Kira and accompanies him to Fortress Kira with the Jedi. In the audio version, Galia is taken to safety by Tott Doneeta, while Oron Kira and the rest of the Jedi take command from Fortress Kira. Also, in the audio drama, Warb Null loses his arm to Ulic Qel-Droma in their duel before being killed, whereas in the comic version, he is simply killed. Another contradiction occurs when Ulic Qel-Droma blames Warb Null for cleaving Cay Qel-Droma's arm, causing him to show no mercy to Null before killing him. This conflicts with both the comic version and the audio drama, where Cay's arm is severed by Amanoa's royal guards in the former and blasted off by Novar in the latter.