Sarafur, also known as Kuna's Tail III due to its location within the Kuna's Tail system, was a planet situated in the Moddell sector of the Outer Rim Territories. This world was tidally locked with its sun, resulting in the same portion of its desert-covered landscape consistently facing the star. The surface of Sarafur featured scattered ancient stone ruins. The Krasho Salt Rifts, a desiccated seabed marked by monolithic salt formations, fossilized corals, and the skeletons of immense aquatic lifeforms, was situated in the zone dividing the illuminated and shadowed regions of the planet.
Once, Sarafur was inhabited by a sentient species that thrived in a vibrant city close to the planet's terminator. The Killiks from Alderaan also settled this world, establishing numerous nests. However, the original species eventually died out, and the Killiks abandoned Sarafur around 30,000 BBY. A Killik Sith warrior, after being exiled from Alsakan, sought sanctuary on Sarafur within a building that ultimately became his tomb. In the millennia before 25,200 BBY, the Infinite Empire claimed the planet.
During the reign of the Galactic Empire, the ruins of Sarafur became a haven for grave-robbers, prospectors, treasure hunters, fugitives, and various criminal elements. Legends arose, suggesting that Sarafur concealed one or both of the two artifacts known as the Tessents. Around 3 ABY, a group of treasure hunters explored the Killik Sith warrior's tomb in pursuit of these artifacts.
Kuna's Tail III was a terrestrial planet of small size, orbiting the yellow star of the Kuna's Tail system in the third orbital position. It was located in the Outer Moddell systems region of the Moddell sector, which itself was a subsectors within the Inner Zuma Region of the Outer Rim Territories' Zuma sector. A hyperlane connected the planet to the Kuna's Fist system. The system was named Kuna's Tail because it formed a part of the Kuna constellation, a designation given by the Ayrou species of Maya Kovel. Within the Moddell sector, Sarafur was the local name for Kuna's Tail III.
Sarafur possessed a standard gravity, a breathable Type I atmosphere, and a climate that ranged from temperate to hot. Due to its tidal locking, the same areas of the planet's surface perpetually faced its sun. The boundary between the light and dark zones presented desolate and forbidding landscapes and was the only habitable region. Sarafur's surface was largely a dangerous and desolate desert. Some astronomers posited that the tidal locking occurred so rapidly that Sarafur's original sea—which became the Krasho Salt Rifts—evaporated within a few years or even months.
Sarafur once functioned as a colony for the Killiks, a hive-minded insectoids group that originated from Alderaan in the Core Worlds. The Celestials, a powerful race, transplanted the Killiks from their homeworld. Both species vanished from the known galaxy by 30,000 BBY. Between that time and approximately 25,200 BBY, Sarafur fell under the dominion of the Infinite Empire of the Rakata.
A Killik Sith warrior, fleeing persecution on Alsakan in the Core Worlds, found refuge on Sarafur long before Humans settled there between 27,000 BBY and 26,000 BBY. After his death, the Sith's tomb became a nexus of the dark side of the Force, and his arrival became the subject of an ancient Shistavanen legend. An Alsakani dark side adept named Jilst Bindalin eventually learned of this legend and located the tomb. After stealing an artifact, Bindalin hired a Shistavanen starship captain to transport him and the artifact to Sarafur, where he disappeared.
Around 3643 BBY, an individual involved in the Sith Wars between the Galactic Republic and the reconstituted Sith Empire dispatched a companion to Sarafur to investigate the abandoned Killik nests. The companion found belongings of long-lost Joiners—those assimilated into the Killik hive mind—and a quantity of old, crystallized membrosia, a Killik liquor.
Rumors in various cantinas claimed that one or both of the two artifacts known as the Tessents were hidden on Sarafur, though they were actually on Ast Kikorie and Vasha. The rumors suggested a crime boss or spice lord residing in Sarafur's ruins possessed at least one Tessent. Other stories told of the artifacts falling into the hands of grave-robbers or resting in the crypt of an alien ruler beneath a crime lord's hideout. Doctor Follnor Callat, a xenoarchaeologist seeking the Alsakan Tessent, knew of a tale about a dark side spirit in the planet's ruins, but not the Killik Sith legend.
Around 3 ABY, the rogue assassin droid LC-Zed, fleeing a killing spree in the Spar sector, sought refuge on Sarafur, arriving in a stolen shuttle and seeking repairs to leave. Around the same time, the Vashan Liberation Force, a group of twenty Vashans planning a revolt against Ayrou control of Vasha, formed on Sarafur. A group of treasure hunters also arrived, seeking the Tessents. They encountered the shipjacker Tershan and his crew and explored the Killik Sith's tomb, discovering a Sith holocron.
Sarafur was once inhabited by a sentient species that became extinct long before the reign of the Galactic Empire. The Killiks also inhabited the planet but later abandoned it. By the Yuuzhan Vong War, starting in 25 ABY, Sarafur was home to 150,000 individuals of various species. Despite having space-level technology and serving as a shadowport, Sarafur had no significant imports or exports. Lacking a central government, it was a lawless and dangerous world.
Criminal gangs used Sarafur as a primary base. The Xal 3 Armorers' Confederacy, outlaw armorers and weapons technicians, were among the longest-standing residents of Sarafur's ruins. Led by the Trandoshan Kallukoras, they relocated from the Ablajeck sector due to a feud. The Kintan Gunrunners, weapons smugglers active in Hutt Space, the Corporate Sector, and elsewhere, also operated from the planet. Primarily composed of Niktos of various subspecies, they employed species adapted to the desert heat, such as Kamarians, Twi'leks, and Weequays, especially on Sarafur. The Sarafur-based Gunrunners were led by Kajain'sa'Nikto lieutenant Tu'rsc'yulir.
Sarafur's surface was marked by unusual ancient ruins, many constructed from massive stone blocks, located on the border between the illuminated and dark sides. Grave robbers frequented the ruins, and prospectors, treasure hunters, and fugitives used them as hideouts, giving Sarafur a history of harboring underworld figures.
The Xal 3 Armorers' Confederacy established a base in the ruins, receiving daily visits from starships seeking their armor design and repair services. The Vashan Liberation Force also maintained a small base hidden atop collapsed multi-story ruins. Hundreds of Killik nests, well-preserved by the hot climate, had been abandoned millennia before 3643 BBY. By the Yuuzhan Vong War, three limited-service spaceports were also present on Sarafur.
The Krasho Salt Rifts, a former seabed, lay on the meridian dividing Sarafur's illuminated and dark sides, extending for hundreds of kilometers and covering the twilight region for several degrees of latitude. It appeared as a bright spot from orbit. The Rifts were littered with monolithic crystalline salt formations, fossilized corals, and skeletons of colossal sea creatures. The Salt Rifts dried out centuries before the Galactic Empire, with scientists speculating that the rapid desiccation led to the extinction of its aquatic ecosystem.
The Kintan Gunrunners maintained their main base in ruins along the Salt Rifts, slightly into Sarafur's sunlit area, chosen for its privacy due to the high temperatures. They kept their starships in an old arena within the ruins. The Rodian shipjacker Tershan and his crew also operated from the Salt Rifts, planning to establish a more secure base in a dense cluster of ruins north of their temporary location. Arcona criminal groups occasionally mined the crystal spires due to their addiction to salt.
A bustling city of Sarafur's original inhabitants once stood at the edge of the Krasho Salt Rifts, beyond the future base of the Xal 3 Armorers' Confederacy. The city included a building with baths of sulfurous mineral waters. After a Killik Sith resided there and died, the building became his tomb. Collapsing columns and walls buried the baths, making them one of the few surface-level water reservoirs in Sarafur's twilight zone.
Sarafur debuted in the roleplaying adventure "Race for the Tessent," published for Star Wars Roleplaying Game by Wizards of the Coast in Star Wars Gamer magazine, ninth issue on February 22, 2002. The Essential Atlas (2009) placed Sarafur in grid square H-16. The 2011 BioWare video game Star Wars: The Old Republic mentioned the planet in a Scavenging Crew Skill mission, but the mission's outcome was later removed.
Instead of a fixed plot, "Race for the Tessent" offers multiple settings in the Moddell sector, including Sarafur, for player characters searching for the Tessents. It suggests scenarios for a Tessent being hidden in each setting, noting that Jilst Bindalin could have brought the Alsakan Tessent to the Killik Sith warrior's tomb on Sarafur. This article assumes that the Alsakan and Ayrou Tessents were hidden on Ast Kikorie and Vasha, respectively, based on non-contradictory information from the adventure considered canonical within Star Wars Legends.
"Race for the Tessent" presents a contradiction regarding the Killik Sith warrior's arrival on Sarafur. It states that the Sith came from Alsakan before Human colonization, yet also claims Humans drove the Killik off Alsakan. This article assumes the latter statement is incorrect.
The adventure and "Endor and the Moddell Sector" in Star Wars Gamer 9 contain problematic statements about Sarafur as a tidally locked world that rotates synchronously with its orbit. The latter describes it as "a world that no longer rotates, spinning around the Tail's yellow sun with one face always locked toward it," a self-contradictory statement. If Sarafur did not revolve around its own axis of rotation, it could not keep the same side facing its sun as it orbited the star. "Endor and the Moddell Sector" also lists Sarafur's local year as 240 "local days" long, despite the concept of a local day being undefined for tidally locked planets.
Finally, both articles incorrectly refer to the region around the border between Sarafur's illuminated and dark sides, its terminator. "Endor and the Moddell Sector" calls it the "equatorial region," while "Race for the Tessent" calls it the "event horizon," a term referring to a zone around a black hole in Star Wars. The equator is a line equidistant from a celestial body's poles and perpendicular to its meridians, with which the terminator must coincide at any given moment.