No Longer a Game (Solo Dev/Training)

[Nia Siroc]

[SIZE=14.6667px]The Jedi were not what Nia Siroc had always imagined them to be. The last year and a half had shown them to be fallible, complete with the failings of any being. Though their intentions had largely been noble, their actions had not always been so. What she had learned was that the galaxy was a very hard place where you either adapted or you died. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Thus did the apprentice find herself redoubling her efforts in the ways of the Force and the martial arts. Many free hours spent wandering the domed gardens, staring into the skies were now devoted to things more practical. Nia’s instructors looked on in approval as she asked for extra training after classes. Instead of daydreaming in the gardens, Nia deepened her connection to the Force in meditation too. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]So it was that she found herself defeating apprentices in sparring who before had bested her. Because the galaxy was hard, she would have to be hard. There was no time for the scared child with a head full of stories anymore. Though not quite eighteen, it was time to grow up.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Watching friends hurt and starting down death herself had shown her the drills with a remote weren’t a game. Sparring was no longer something to be approached with trepidation. Meditation was not boring and pointless. The study of history, politics and sciences became essential. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=14.6667px]It was in these intermediate weeks and months that Nia Siroc truly began to progress….[/SIZE]

 

[Nia Siroc]

A training session from the perspective on an instructor:

Something had changed about Nia Siroc, her lightsaber master had noticed in the past several weeks. Ever since she'd come back from an excursion, the girl had felt so much more tightly coiled. She'd taken again to her lessons with a predator's intensity. The apprentice hardly seemed to blink as she absorbed every word.

Discreet inquiries had allowed him to glean that things had gone very wrong in the desert. He worried about the mental well-being of his students as much as their physical. But he thought the extra practice she'd taken to would be a good thing. As much as it had already begun to sharpen her skills, it also functioned as an outlet.

He watched with folded arms, the apprentice blindfolded with a remote hovering. At random intervals, the stun bolts would come and she would interpose her yellow-hued blade, angling the shot harmlessly away. Each time, she brought her blade back smoothly and automatically, ready to ward off the next attack. Nia practically pulsed with focus though the Force.

It wasn't that Nia had suddenly gained some great power, but rather, her connection to her internal well had become much smoother. Something had shifted, a door had been opened, he thought as he silently observed. It was very sudden thing and that gave him some pause. Now was a critical time in the life and training of the young woman....