Benthic Infiltrator

The Benthic Infiltrator was released in 2015 as part of the Battle for Zendikar set, a block that revisited the plane of Zendikar amidst an ongoing conflict with the otherworldly Eldrazi. This card belongs to the 'devoid' mechanic, a design choice intended to represent the colorless nature of the Eldrazi even when those spells required colored mana to cast. It occupies a space in the limited environment as a functional utility creature, designed to leverage the ingest mechanic that defined much of the set’s blue-aligned Eldrazi units.

The illustration was rendered by artist Deruchenko Alexander, who crafted a haunting depiction of the creature’s unsettling, alien anatomy. The design emphasizes the fluid and stealthy nature of the Infiltrator, favoring a muted, ethereal color palette that distinguishes it from the more terrestrial denizens of the Zendikar plane. Upon its debut, the card was received primarily as a structural piece for draft and sealed play, noted for its ability to enable graveyard-based synergies that were central to the set's mechanical identity.