Old Tomes and Busted Bones

[Vio]

"When are we going to get there?", the voice of an old man asked, shuffling towards the pilot of the shuttle.

"Twelve hours, sir.", replied the pilot, a younger man, wearing the standard pilot's garb of the CIS.

Fantastic, the old man thought to himself. Twelve more hours on this god-forsaken shuttle with nothing but two boring pilots, deactivated droids, and boxes of old... the old man stopped. Haven't looked in some of them for ages... might as well now, he concluded, heading to the small cargo bay. Dozens of large crates sat stacked in the corner, their contents labeled. The bottom box had the longest label of all of them, reading 'Lightsabers, Blasters, vibroknives, knuckledusters, and grenades'. Best not open that one, he thought, moving upwards. Book Collection (Non-Fiction) #1, and number two, three, four... seven. Shevaltesh preferred Non-fiction anyway. Who would want to read a bunch of fake bullcrap?

He continued looking, once more running his finger underneath many labels. Ancient Alcohol #1 and #2, Skulls #1 through #4, Eye Collection #1 through #3. Shevaltesh moved the crates he had already examined to the side, mostly using his force telekinesis rather than his actual body strength. Ancient Sith Burial Shrouds #1, Ancient Sith Apparel #1 through #5, Ancient Sith Jewelry #1 and #2, Gems, Precious Stones, Precious Metals, and other Jewelry #1 through #8. By the stars, Shevaltesh wasn't even a woman and he had more valuable gems and jewelry than even the most luxurious noblewoman could hope to have.

Pushing them aside as well, and ignoring the others, he spotted something interesting. Miscellaneous #1, the crate's label read, clearly the oldest out of all of them, save for probably Book Collection (Non-Fiction) #1. Making a makeshift seat for himself out of the other crates and pulling the Miscellaneous crate towards him, Shevaltesh opened it and began to examine its contents. Surprisingly, the crate only contained a single item, a rather large red book, inscribed Book of Sith sat alone.

Grabbing the tome and placing it in his lap, Shevaltesh tried to remember where he had acquired this from. Within moments, the memories flooded back to him. The Book of Sith was originally created by Emperor Palpatine, Darth Sidious, containing various scraps from many different Sith writings throughout history. A seeker of knowledge, during the Four Hundred Year Darkness, Shevaltesh had explored the galaxy, slowly gathering Sith Writings and Teachings, even making some of his own on Sith Magic and Sith Alchemy.

As he opened the page, he first encountered the complete Chronicle of Sorzus Syn, Palpatine having acquired many pages of it but not the complete thing, with Shevaltesh using Sith Magic and his possession of some of the pages to find the rest. They had been hidden on Korriban, in an ancient tomb, and the only thing standing between him and the precious Chronicle of Sorzus Syn was a guardian...

 

[Vio]

...Hundreds of years ago...

Korriban, Hidden Location of the Chronicles of Sorzus Syn

"Well, this is the place.", said a handsome young man to his 'friend', Tessa Blackburn.

His friend, a rather buxom young woman, short but pretty, turned to him, a Mandalorian Helmet in her hand. "Took you long enough to find it...", she said mockingly.

"Who knows how long it might've been if I didn't have Sith Magic on my side?", he said, turning and smiling to her, holding his right hand to his face and allowing dark tendrils of Force Lightning to dance between his fingertips. To his joy, she laughed, donning her helmet.

"Let's do this. Try not to get killed, Sev.", she said, abbreviating his Sith name for the shorter nickname. "I'll do my best."

Before them stood the large entrance to a cave, which had been covered by rocks that Sev easily moved aside. Stepping inside together, the thrum of his red lightsaber and the light zzz of the lights on her dual pistols and helmet were both the only light and noise apart from their footsteps that they heard. Advancing side by side, they walked deep into the vast cave, rocks and dust falling around them, the area clearly untouched for thousands of years.

As Sev turned to Tes to make a comment or jape, the sound of heavy footsteps, many heavy footsteps, cut him off before he could even open his mouth, his lightsaber instinctively snapping to ready position as Tes took a few steps behind him, her blasters drawn.

 

[Vio]

"What is that noise?", Tes said, her two pistols slowly moving around the cavern, looking for any signs of the footsteps.

"Don't know. But it sounds bad. Metal feet on stone, sounds like twenty of them, all in unison.", he said, just as the source of the sound in question came into their view. Sev was right, about twenty men, wearing ancient Sith Iron armor, wielding bright swords and big shields.

"Halt!", came the voice of the red-skinned man in the front. "We are the Sith Guardians. We have been in sleep here waiting for someone to disturb our sleep. You have." "We come in peace!", Sev said, deactivating his lightsaber and putting his hands slightly into the air so they can see.

"Charge!", the man, said, followed by the thunderous, echoing noise of swords banging on shields and their charge forward.

"Help me out here! ", Tess yelled, using her jetpack to boost behind them and firing dozens of shots at them, before fighting three at the same time in combat.

Igniting his lightsaber, Sev cut down three of the men before leaping across the main group of them, cutting down the men attacking Tess...

 

[Vio]

That was a close fight, Shevaltesh thought, as he ran his gloved fingers across the pages of the chronicles. The guards were actually ancient pureblood sith who had been frozen to protect the ancient tomb, later to be used by a novice force user to guard some artifacts he had collected, including the Chronicles. The rest of Malgus' war journal was found in the ruins of Dromund Kaas, and Wild Power by Mother Talzin was taken off the body of a Nightsister Sith Lady. The Rule of Two by Palpatine and The Science of Creating Life by Darth Plagueis were found in one of Palpatine's secret vaults, and the Dark Side Compendium was found in a similar vault on a planet not too far away.

Many other items had been included made by Darth Shevaltesh himself, such as tomes on the use of Sith Rune Magic and the creation of pools of Sith Magic Energy. His favorite was a large set of texts chronicling and detailing all of his adventures and trips through the galaxy in order to complete a true book of the Sith the way he saw fit. Closing the tome, he sealed it with a rune of Sith magic and an amount of his own blood, setting it back in the crate and shutting it.