Invasion Warlords of the Sith vs Th Sith Empire | Invasion of Malachor V |

[Darth Vinaze]

Kascalion Giedfield | Vector Monk

​

Vinaze could not argue with the harbinger of the Sith, so he remained begrudgingly silent as the archaeologist and his assistant joined them. With any luck these men would not survive the sheer amount of power that he could feel calling him to far below. They were on the edge of an otherworldly aura of the darkside, more hungry than any he’d felt before. And just as the font of power was hungry, so too were the Sith lords.

The undead stalking the halls, risen by ancient magicks to defend even more ancient treasures, could not stand in their way. What pressed them harder were the winding halls that reminded him of the academy on Korriban, or moreso the twisted and haunting version Ashin had shown him visions of.

The power was threatening to consume all by the time they reached the abyssal pit. Kascalion and Vinaze were both aware that when they descended these stairs they would be faced with the full power of the pure dark side nexus. He wondered if Monk could feel the energy in any way, even if it was just a fraction of what the Sith Lords could sense waiting for them in the red-hued void.

The descent reminded him of the first time Voyance had taken him to Sepulcher, where he spent weeks alone in the deepest crypts of the planet’s mausoleums. His Umbaran eyes had let him go further than any man had while in the full embrace of the darkness, not a shred of light to be seen.

Even though he could see the steps ahead of him well, he still tread carefully. The steps were slick with moss and mildew, as the temple was perhaps the last bastion of any moisture in the desiccated wastes that surrounded it. A fall of this caliber would certainly be an ungracious end, so close to the final goal.

The great black doors that waited for them at the base of the pit had the same feeling as many doors of this kind he’d seen in temples in his travels. These were the kinds of doors that required both great strength and great respect to pass through, and served as warnings to any lesser Sith who would dare to test their mettle here.

With no physical strength to spare, Vinaze pushed deeply through the force to move the gargantuan stones open. The lights from inside the ancient chamber washed over him, searing his fragile retinas that were not accustomed to such changes in light so quickly. As he waited for them to adjust, he began to realize he could not see.

What followed his blindness was the increasing feeling of rage. Not his own, but that of another so powerful it bled into everything around it. Then he heard the guardians roar. Though he could not see the beast, he could feel it perfectly through the force. Nothing had ever been so clear as this monster in his clairvoyance.

Life was the domain of Darth Vinaze. He created life, he twisted life. Death was never his compatriot. But now he was surrounded by it. To use the most powerful of the ancient spells known to his maternal homeland required great power, and as the dark side radiated all around them and seeped into his body, he knew he might be able to muster the strength required to raise the dead. He had not used the arts of the Witches of Dathomir since his childhood, before the Sith. And he had never done this before.

Entombed in this room were some of the finest warriors the Sith had ever known, their names and deeds now lost to eternity. But not their purpose.

He knelt down and placed his hands in his lap, like he had done outside to call to his living soldiers. Now he called to a realm beyond the living, trying to see past the force as it was in this realm. When his will finally connected to wherever the souls of these warriors rested, they burst from their dark granite prisons, still adorned with the decaying and rusted weapons and armour they had died in.

Six skeletal warriors with a vile green mist fuming from their skulls began to run towards the guardian of their tomb. They jumped on to it, clawing, gnashing, and stabbing both their swords and their bones into. It roared in pain and anger again, shaking wildly to get them off

He knew the Sith’ari’s goal lay at the end of the room. He could feel that power too, though he could not discern its source in this chaos.

He begged silently through the force to his master. He didn't know how long he could hold these warriors to his will.

“Go Kascalion! Harness the power!”

 

[Dasam Kal]

The Fields of Ash, Malachor V
Allies: Warlords of the Sith
Opposition: Valen | The Sith Empire

[THEME]

​

"TAKE COVER!" One of the troopers screamed out as the men of Sigma-Five-Delta let out a hail of bolts down onto the Chapter Troopers from the advantageous position. Some of the squad hit the ashen ground once they caught a bolt or two, rendered dead. It took the initiative of a determined corporal to come with the sound decision of utilizing smoke grenades to obscure some of Sigma-Five-Delta's view and save the remainder of his squad from a textbook kill zone. Giving just enough leeway for the Chapter Troopers to get onto the natural pieces of cover and have a chance against the foe that outclassed them. However slim that chance maybe.

As for the pair of Sith, the smoke hardly intervened with the environment of their clash. And it began once Valen closed in at such a steady pace to his opponent. With a swing of the crimson guarded saber, Dasam turned his blade over and extended his arms out to catch the blow, defending himself from the flurry that came afterward. It was one that screamed for violence and was fueled with emotion. The Sith Tactician merely testing the waters as he blocked and parried whatever strikes were to come, analyzing how talented this Acolyte was in the art of the Lightsaber. All in the meantime, Dasam's golden gaze was just buried into the eyes of the Acolyte as if it were locked on. He never set it towards the attacks that he successfully blocked, for he did not need his eyes for that purpose. He had the force as his tool and the third form as his choice of saber combat.

With his eyes locked onto the Acolyte, there was a purpose behind this visual act. An attempt of bringing fear from his opponent, to show that regardless of the battle around them. When it came to this very duel, Dasam was definitely in control.

As a finishing strike was headed for the Tactician, he bounced back to avoid the blow. Breaking his defensive pattern. Dasam wanted to learn more about his foe, ripping away whatever energies of the force around him and onto the palm of his spare hand. The Sith drew out an intense pressure outward to the Acolyte, a mere push of the force.

He was curious as to how the Acolyte will react. Valen seemed unlike many in his status.
An anomaly that needed study.

 

[Darth Kentarch]

Location: Fields of Ash
Allies: Warlords of the Sith
Enemies: TSE, Laertia Io
Equipment: Lightsaber | Nightfall | Duskfall

The CIS. She was an agent or acted in the capacity of the Confederacy.

Whenever Kentarch fought against the Sith Empire, he always seemed to end up fighting agents of the CIS. His opponent spouted nonsense and whataboutisms of the Bryn'adul. His first encounter with CIS agents was in Mandalore, long before the Bryn'adul first emerged.

"I see, you fight for the Confederacy. In another time I was one of the founding congress members of the CIS. I doubt my membership still stands. Many of us at the time were refugees from the expanding Sith Empire. They destroyed my home, everything that I had. I only fight the Empire and those who stand between me and them." Kentarch's voice called out again, seemingly in front of XIphos. No reason to give away his current position. Anger welled up within his as he thought of the Sith bombardment of Ession. But enough of ancient history.

Xiphos had summoned debris to defend herself in an orbital method. She expected his stealth attack. He was ready to strike, his sword Duskfall was still drawn. A force cloak concealed his movement, and Kentarch closed in on Xiphos from behind His cloak broke right behind her, the orbital debris smashed into his left shoulder, he timed it perfectly. Kentarch thrusted the point of his sword Duskfall, able to pierce through armor, right center back of Xiphos's spinal cord.

 

[Ulrich]

Opponent : Khamul Kryze

Indra​

My vision too myopic focused by hatred so that I didn't take into account all the tools at Khamul's disposal. With the use of his missile I had expected the Mandalorian to be out of physical explosives. Desperation made one resourceful however and I had foolishly forgotten that the jetpack was quite capable of detonation even without the missile that it had launched. The force of the blast peppered me with shrapnel but honestly that was little more than a side effect to the force of the explosion.

The weight of the detonation slammed into my wings as they bore me aloft. I wasn't flying high and thus I didn't have much in the way of time to correct myself when it happened dragging me down into the implacable tide of rock that raged bellow me. My motions were almost ophidian as I twisted vainly in hopes of averting the inevitable. Then I hit the flood of rock and earth scales impacting shale with violent force. The very same factors that had damned me to this river of debris stopped boulders that would crush one of the hominid races from simply pulverizing me but there was no escaping the pull of the tide. I raise my voice letting my roar compete with the roar of the tortured earth.

"Don't think this is over Khamul. You have prolonged your time on the mortal coil but the dead are everywhere and as long as they are watching I can track you down. Every corpse , shade and bloodsucker will devote their eternity to track you down I swear it upon the name of Typhojem and all the blackened gods of the hereafter. "

Enough time for one more act of malice, even as I'm swept away to parts unknown I let out a curse. Words in the ancient sith tongue infused with my power and will reach out causing the ground behind Kryze to erupt into a shower of black shards. Poor revenants these barely cobbled together scarecrows of bone and rock. They fling themselves towards the Mandalorian aiming to bear him down into the maelstrom so that he might have his own baptism of rock and pain.

 

[Kalt Bruq]

Kalt was surprised at the sudden shift of attention by their opponent. He was clearly the lesser threat in this engagement but apparently something he had done had drawn his enemy's ire. Kalt, raised his lightsaber, in a defensive stance, choosing not to draw his focus away from his concealment of his master's presence in the force. The visible draw of attention away from the more pressing threat suggested that the concealment was doing more than what he might otherwise know. His projection of Alina, also maintained it's advance, striking as programmed in an attempt to force it's opponent to dodge or parry, creating an opening for Alina to strike. Once successful it would pull away to the right; Maleva's left side, to give space for Alina to make her strike.

Beyond the individual duel happening before him, he noticed a loyal soldier of the Empire get blasted before he can contribute. Tracing the trajectory for a moment he saw the figure of a man, holding a blaster and lance in each hand. He wasn't sure of his intentions but he had just taken a side that wasn't his own. "We've got an interloper Alina." He called out.

He shifted his stance, so as to put himself between the interloper and the dark lord his master was facing.

[ Alina Tremiru , Darth Maleva, Quintus Varro ]​

 

[Vector Monk]

// it's a spell that can't be broken
// it'll keep you up all night
// boy, you belong to me
// I got the recipe and it's called black magic
​

"Incredible!"

Vector could indeed feel the darkness here despite his Force blind nature. Beneath the physical sensations...an unnatural chill which pervaded the Academy's lowest levels, half glimpsed nightmares through the corner of his eye...there was a subtle mood altering effect that only experience working in proximity with other vergences prepared him for. Even then it considerable self control to ignore every instinct in his bones screaming at the tomb raider to run.

Once they neared the lowest Reclamation Service dig sites Captain Monk had begun to worry Kascalion Giedfield would grow annoyed with his academic fumblings but as fortune would have it just when they began to pass into truly unfamiliar territory the ancient lich brushed him and Ygor roughly aside. Even though it was obvious Darth Vinaze wanted him dead the deformed warrior made no move to cut him down. He began to suspect this one for whatever reason would not cross the other. Understanding Sith power dynamics was often critical to survival in service of the Empire.

What had provoked him at last to voice his awe was the ebon archway they now stood before. It was a marvel of Sith architecture, and most incongruous with the Academy proper. Monk wondered if it was even Second Dynasty at all. When the rebels tore its gate open he too was blinded by the same bright light.

"How...marvelous."

Vision seemed like a curse. Vector averted his gaze from Kascalion's grisly trophy, instead pointedly inspecting just about everything else in the chamber. There was certainly enough to occupy his curiosity of a less scarring nature. Drawn by glints of metal, Captain Monk removed fine layers of dust from an ancient Sith shield amulet. Before he could inspect its inscriptions the pillar next to him crumbled under the darkside creature's weight.

"Slay this damned thing! NOW!"

"At once, my lord!"

He drew the Minos particle blaster at his hip. Neither Sith had bothered to confiscate his weapons for they feared him so little. Perhaps there was something to that disdain for each shot he fired only seemed to enrage the tomb guardian further. Caught between a charging horror and the stunned Giedfield, Monk kept firing in vain until the first of Vinaze's skeletons leapt into the fray breaking its charge just before he would have been disemboweled.

Instead Vector circled around back towards the stairs still shooting his blaster. He palmed the thermal detonator behind his back and glanced around. Crumbling foundations. If he set off explosives just so the entire passage would be sealed. Captain Monk hesitated...after all, witnessing a ritual like this was quite possibly a once in a lifetime experience.

 

[Laertia Io]

"The Sith butchered my Family. Dismembered my Parents..." Xiphos called out, annoyed at his vengeance motive, for it ironically echoed the grievances she had heard from every Jedi who had been wronged by the Sith at all those useless meetings at Dantooine. "But that still hasn't made me forget that The Bryn'adul are the biggest danger to the Galaxy at the moment. Bigger than your grievances with The Sith..."

The faint displacement of ash shifting through the air gave it away. She wasn't fooled by the fact his voice seemed to be far in front of her in the ash cloud. Her training as a former Magician had educated her much in how people throw their voice.

She felt his anger at the tragedy of Ession. Weakness...

She twisted out of the way at the last second, using the speed and reflex increasing properties of her Armor , swatting aside his blade with the flair of a Form Two practitioner.

"Two stealth attacks in a row. Why, Former Statesman, you disappoint me..." she mocked, noting the remains of debris on his shoulder. "Surely you can do better! "

She ruthlessly focused on his shoulder, ruthlessly driving forward power attacks at it, with both blades, trying to make him defend that side and thus injure himself further.

"Although, considering you were a politician, I suppose backstabbing is second nature to you."

She drew on her Dun Moch, hoping to exploit his anger further and use it against him.

"If this is how you fight its no wonder you lost your family at...you know what? I can't even be bothered to remember the name of your planet...its dead, like your family. Join them. "

Xiphos struck from all sides, her fiery orange blade swinging for his throat while her SynthBreaker blade sought to knock Duskfall out of his hand. But there was still a chance he might be able to dodge, and in her focus on attacking his upper body she had beem forced to drop the debris orbiting her. He might be able to use it himself...plus there was still the fact he was using two blades. The Sword of Cinndurr was still a third slower to swing than her other blade, making it the best avenue to launch a counter-attack...

"Die as you deserve to!" Xiphos shouted to Darth Kentarch as she attacked...

 

[Kascalion Giedfield]

EQUIPMENT: Armor - X | Main-Hand Lightsaber - X | Off-Hand Lightsaber - X | Right Arm - X
OBJECTIVE 2: Treasures of Trayus
Primary RP Partner: Darth Vinaze
Overarching Opponents: TSE
Who Else Is At Trayus: Ihsan | Zinn Zinn Bink'sa | Vector Monk | Onrai | Laertia Io | Aurelion Nova | Lesaj
What is Inside Trayus Academy (NPCS): Sith Statues | Sithspawn
Overarching Allies: WotS | Respective Allies
NPC Allies: The Convergent Order
Post Theme: The Nameless City

​

The others sprung into action on his command, earning their reprieve if this battle was won, but he was uncertain that it would be won. Normally, the Devil would have been assured of his own victory as he had with all others in previous years, but this was one he could not be certain of. The unnatural hate of this beast - one stoved up for untold years - was so damning that Kascalion felt it necessary to commence a tactical retreat for but a moment. Such rage could not be tamed and this creature was surely not one to fall with ease. The visible increase in size as this Monk fired upon it with his blaster was the fact of this internal claim, and the roars that came from its infernal maw were the exclamation points.

Even when the Devil refound some level of courage to find his feet and draw his blades, he found it hard to ignite them and - dare he admit it - impossible to attack. Such was the apprehension of even approaching this new obstacle to this goal - one of such importance that only two others rivaled it: the dominion of all life and unlife in the Galaxy and the slaying of the demon Irveric Tavlar . He could not let this impede his path and yet it did so effortlessly. And as it had briefly appeared on Helgard against the intrepid and ever-defiant Lyra 'Sybila' Voikryt , the old fear began to rise in his belly and force its way up into his chest. Clawing at his lungs, pressing against his ribs, scratching at his heart, trying to breach his esophagus and erupt as sickened bile. The beast was dread incarnate and the Dread Lord was quaking in his boots.

And at that moment, as his gaze fell upon the eyes of the beast, every doubt that he had ever had in his millennia of life, every epoch of defeats and death, and every eon of suffering in the starless void that awaited all sinners like him after the end...all of it came rushing back to memory. His grip on the blades loosened, the Devil now nothing more than that boy-warrior on a lush world of mysticism, claiming his fame for being a Skator Hai with power when none others had it. He was not a God, was he? He was...a pretender to an invisible throne. He was a fake, a fraud, a phony, a charlatan, a cheat, and an imposter. A matricide. A patricide. A kin slayer to the last ounce of being. He was nothing who felt nothing but...regret.

The Devil turned his gaze to his kneeling compatriot - one he would have called friend in another life - and, for the first time in as long as he could remember, felt a sense of somber comfort in not being alone. He was a true Sith. One who believed in the power of the Dark Side and earned it through his own studies in a single life, not through countless deaths and rebirths because of a curse enforced upon him by a greedy parent. Kept at heel by a Nexus upon a dead world. Without men and women like him to hide his failures behind blind sycophancy, he would have been forgotten and lost since his first death.

He was ready, now, to accept that and accept his failure even after coming so close.

Until that loyal Darth Vinaze - ever the pragmatist - erupted into battle with the summoning of those warriors who lay in ruin within this hellish chamber. Green energies from beyond the veil formed like wraiths and sunk into the dead marrow of six skeletal remains who rose with haste at the beckoning of their new master. And with mindless abandon and unshakeable resolve, the risen warriors charged the monstrous terentatek and pierced its hide with unnatural might, skewering muscle with old steel and hardened bone. The beast screeched in even more rage as it tromped around the room, crashing into pillar after pillar to remove these rats from its body. But fastened to it did they remain, even as the ceiling began to crumble down from the battle.

And there it was. Like a twinkle in a child's eye on Life Day, he felt...gratitude. Gratitude for still believing in this rotten thing enough to follow his orders. To protect him. Gratitude. It was a passing feeling - one that was quickly replaced by a surge of his fury and dark passion for power - but it was there. The words uttered by his Sithly companion solidified that: "Go Kascalion! Harness the power!"

The Devil turned back to the shrine at the end of the room, where on it laid an aged weapon, curved and black. Next to it: an onyx tablet, the words on which the Devil could not perceive. Curiously, in all of the destruction ushered by the great titan of meat, that shrine had not been damaged at all. A true guardian, at the very least.

With quick building breaths that lead into a mighty roar of his own, the Devil broke the fear, the doubts, the memories. Everything fell away for one chance - one moment - one opportunity - to prove to himself, those around him, and to those that would come after him, that he was still a Sith Lord. He was still a warrior. That he was the Dread Lord of the Warlords of the Sith, the High Lord of Convergence, and that even a God could have a moment of fear and doubt.

The Devil charged, sprinting with thunderous steps that cracked the stone floor, and simultaneously reached out with the Force for the hilt of the weapon. It only moved an inch when the Devil reached the center of the room, having to drop his hand and fall to the floor to avoid a swinging lash from the beast attempting to stop the Sith Lord's plan. The ground shook from the steps of the beast as it continued to fight against the skeletal warriors. Pushing himself back up with effort, the charge resumed as did the reaching out with the Force. Senses ringing and blood pulsating through his cold veins as the heaves of blue embers flew from the grating of his helmet, the Devil growled in growing rage the closer he drew to the shrine. The weapon shuddered against the pull as if actively resisting the command of its would-be owner. With final steps that slowed to a gouging slide against the floor, the Devil reached the shrine at last just as the weapon screeched in movement against the stonework. Perhaps it required a true fleshy grasp to be lifted, which the Devil would have gladly done had the great guardian not conveniently done its own on the Dread Lord.

"You will not stop me!" he cried out with ultimate fury as the beast brought him to bear before its gaze. A gauntleted hand shot out on instinct, a great stream of purple lightning crackling forth into the opening maw of the guardian which was clearly intent on devouring its foe. The electrical currents knocked the beast back, but did little in the way of damage, the size of it only enlargening once more, now nearly twenty feet in height and fifteen in width.

The ferocity and wrath of both entities in the Force clashed as the Devil beat his hand against the great titanic monstrosity, glaring with pure malice as the maw was reopened. The skeletal warriors were incapable of doing anything now, their weapons and bone piercing only epidermis. But there was no fear now. There was no doubt. Only certainty. Assurance.

With one final extension of his hand, the Devil cried out a curse in his native tongue that shook the foundations of the chamber to its core and from his fingers came forth black electrical fire that carved through the face of the beast. It dropped him as it wailed in agony and sickness, falling off to the side of the Corrupted One and the Imperial, blinded and choking on its melting flesh. The Devil paid it no mind and rose from the ground for a final time, marching to the clawed shrine and grasping the hilt of the weapon - a massive axe coated in old blood and marred with scars.

The power rushed through his hand instantly, and red flames coated his body in a half-second. The energy of it shattered the armor covering his arm and instantly rent his flesh to the bone. But his grasp did not weaken. It did not waver. Even as the last vein was scorched by whatever corruptive power had infested this blade, the Devil's willpower was godly. The corruption spread and spread and spread as he slowly lifted the axe from the shrine, ignoring the searing agony as his shoulder was dissolved, and then his torso, and his legs. Mutilated and destroyed yet kept alive. Was this the fate of those in the room? Did they fail whatever test this was?

And then he looked to the tablet and perceived only two words, the meaning of which he understood immediately. The others in this room...the long-deceased warriors, they simply did not have the willpower to do it. The Devil turned his gaze, wreathed in flame, and looked to his frail, yet undeniably a presence in the Force more so than most in the Galaxy. Vinaze. The one who had been with him since the start. Since the Dread Ascendancy, since the days when Kascalion began to name himself Sith'ari. He had always been loyal. Always been his servant.

Now was the time for his reward.

With the effort of a Deity, the Devil lifted the axe in full and swiftly swung his boy to point the hook of its blade at the man and - in a solemn whisper - uttered another curse in his native tongue. In Vinaze's blindness, he would likely only be able to somewhat perceive what came for him from Kascalion's position in the room. But the Imperial Monk would have seen everything that happened. He would have seen a brilliant white light, the purest of lights, shining forth in a thin beam from the tip of the axe onto the forehead of the Corrupted One. He would see how it remained there for a second, warm and caring like a sun, before, just as quickly, a crackle of sparkling black energy pierced forth to that same point. If successful, if he was willing to do this for the greater good of the Warlords of the Sith, all of Vinaze would be consumed and ascended into a new form beyond the veil of reality, capable of great things yet ethereal for all time to come. This would happen just as the Devil would claim this power, this font of the Force, and...be reborn for one final time. Reborn into his true self. His actual self. Into the body of Kavar Lok Kas'Oni.

The ultimate power of the Umbra. The give and take. The Sacrificial Ascension. The death and rebirth of two.

 

[Darth Vinaze]

Kascalion Giedfield | Vector Monk

"He knows the gate. He is the gate. He is the key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future, all are one."
​

The darkside energy reached its peak as Kascalion lifted the axe from its shrine, as if all of the power in the nexus around them had suddenly infused itself in the Dread Lord. It would have killed many lesser men.

The force was strangely calm for a moment, like the shoreline receding before a tidal wave. The beasts stopped its infernal moan of suffering as it finally succumbed to death, and Kascalion’s heavy footsteps echoed around the chamber. He could feel the intense aura of the Sith’ari getting closer.

He was too weak now. The skeletons had his command crumbled into piles of bone and dust, and he knelt there stunned. His mouth and eyes wide open, tilted towards the black ceiling as if he was trying to pray to the heavens once more before he left this mortal coil. He had not the energy to even speak to Kascalion, and barely enough to process the last moments of his life.

Now more than ever the dark side held him together, keeping his withered muscles from falling off his cracked and gnarled bones. Usually he was in pain. The dark side could keep him mobile and suppress some of it, but he was always plagued by some bodily ailment. But not now. He felt weightless now in the embrace of darkness. Without his sight he was finally able to stare into the void in its completeness. He finally saw into the space beyond the stars, into a cold serenity that he had been preparing himself for.

When Kascalion finally brought the axe down upon him, he didn’t even realize. It was a clean pass from the land of the living into oneness with the force. As the axe harvested the remaining energy from Vinaze’s corporeal form, it dissipated into oblivion. Gone forever.

As his mind transcended he caught a glimpse once more of the prophetic vision he’d had on Exegol, the one that had made him seek out Kascalion in the first place. There, the Dread Lord sat upon a black throne, but it was no longer the same man. It was the Sith’ari born anew, in full power.

As he descended further through hypnagogia, nearing the great sleep, he could see himself floating in the void. Not his withered, almost undead self that he had been when he died, but the young and hale self that he had once been when he began serving Darth Voyance. That man was not Darth Vinaze, but Derleth Par, an identity he had given up and tried so hard to push from his mind.

And as Derleth floated weightless and senseless, out of the pitch dark void came the horrible and mind rending appendages, tentacles of Stygian colour and impossible length. Vinaze, through his disembodied point of view, watched as he was completely enclosed in their writhing grasp, and slowly pulled down into the abyss...

 

[Vector Monk]

// skyfall is where we start
// a thousand miles and poles apart
// where worlds collide and days are dark
// you may have my number, you can take my name
// but you'll never have my heart
​

"Emperor's black bones..." Vector breathed in horrified ecstasy, "Remarkable."

Mortal eyes beheld that which no man should witness. He could not begin to conceive the purpose of such a ritual dyad. Unnatural energies threatened to break his mind. Great rituals required sacrifice. Captain Monk was all too aware of the Sith religion's darkest nature. Yet when the axe came down on Darth Vinaze and his corporeal form was reduced to ash even Vector was shocked. It appeared to him as if the lich had just sacrificed his own willing apprentice.

"Congratulations, my lord!" he called out to Kascalion Giedfield reborn, "Such power...men would kill for it. Men like you and me."

His mask fell away and for the first time Kavar Lok Kas'Oni gazed upon the true face of Vector Monk. There was still admiration in his eyes...but gone was the sniveling reclamation agent's fear. Instead a cunning defiance flashed suddenly across the Sith Lord's awareness. To be underestimated was an incredible gift. Disciplined minds could evade the Force's precognitive danger sense as long as they were clever enough to remain out of focus. He'd quickly established himself as a harmless academic barely worth keeping alive.

"For the Empire."

Vector dropped the beeping thermal detonator and fled back up the ancient steps as fast as his legs could carry him. An explosion triggered quakes throughout Trayus Academy. For all his heroics Monk was nearly buried himself as the stairs collapsed behind him and debris flooded down from a cracked stone archway. Somehow the Sith officer made it through the crumbling passage alive. When the quaking subsided he staggered to his knees coughing up lungfuls of dust.

"I will tell your story, my lord. Vector Monk keeps his promises!"

Although perhaps it would not be the story Kascalion had wanted him to tell. For his tale would venerate a power far greater than the Force or any dark army. Vector's Victory on Malachor would forever serve as a testament to the enduring power...of archaeology.

 

[Darth Luminoth]

WARLORDS OF THE SITH
OBJECTIVE II - TREASURES OF TRAYUS

「THE THING THAT SHOULD NOT BE」

Ihsan | Aurelion Nova | Zinn Zinn Bink'sa | Cara Dorniarn | Lesaj

"From even the greatest of horrors, irony is seldom absent."

​

A stygian form expanded from a single point before the Trayus Academy. A flash of golden light heralded the Dark Sun to manifest from the filament of the force. Insidious wet whispers stark against the reaches of mundane perception emanated their blood-black unknowns from the academy's depths. Disruption in the understood had been the bait, and Luminoth had bitten the hook willingly.

Abominable swine lurked and writhed through the halls, treating it as their own dreadful domain. They sensed his entry at once and swarmed at him in a wave. Fleshy masses fell over each other, teeth bared and screeches resonating with animalistic fury. Luminoth stood unphased. The unfathomable bounds of his multiconscious unfettered in the perception of horrible truths.

The pack broke around him in a bombora of putrid form. His unflinching demeanor and cognitive presence coaxing the deepest sense of self-preservation within the unknowable spawns. The Eldritch felt the plight of the mundane before an indifferent presence. They screamed, growled, and displayed with challenge and protest, but none would again approach. As the Dark Sun began his stride, the evils parted like the sea before a prophet.

When he found her, Ihsan had been reduced to a blabbering, half-awake mess. Bodily tremors among the few things distinguishing her from a corpse. He stared down at her with a nebulous contempt, internal admonitions whispered aloud from the menagerie of voices in his being. "Silence," he demanded sharply, speaking into his shoulder. Luminoth reached down, heaved, threw Ihsan over his shoulder.

With his apprentice draped over him, he turned once more to the incomprehensible spawn. None challenged him. Ihsan's muttering grew louder, panicked, and a chill gripped Luminoth's mind. By taking her, he had disrupted a haunt it seemed. A shade circled them, presenting a threat that the other would not dare. Courage? Or hubris? It must have once been a great lord to defy the makeshift jurisprudence Luminoth had established.

It came upon him without so much as a stutter. Luminoth braced one arm around the back of the legs of his passenger, and snap-outstretched the other. The shade stopped, screamed, began to condense into a sphere. Slowly his hand clenched into a fist as the spirit was closed in little by little. The etheral form faltered, the wisps of what remained trailing into the slits on Luminoth's mask.

Consumed. Every memory, experience, now once beneath the overmind. Horrors screeched as he began to walk down their fearfully obliging part.

 

[Darth Immortuos]

Each day their insipid commands grow weaker and weaker. For the one who claims inheritance to a crumbling empire, this certainly grows stale...

" Indeed." It was a simple comment spoken for the Lord of Wars observation and statement of the situation. Shifty eyes darted over to the specter of Darth Bellum as he better solidified and maintained composure on not only a metaphysical plane but also the physical. This was power. Sheer power to remain rooted in existence and not locked within the gates of the netherworld. Immortuos was no fool when it came to spirits and the things that lurked beyond. Here stood two beings that had not only courted death but cast it aside with their free-will in tact. Free to conqueror and roam as they saw fit.

Pestilence and War.

" What say you to this boy's challenge oh Lord of Decay? "

" Tis hardly be of any challenge at all." he spat and returned his gaze to the would be Dark Lord of the Sith. " The inheritance is indeed his. Though that is the main word to focus on. Inherit. Not earn or conqueror. Given, passed on and accepted." Immortuous found it slightly funny that the un-armored man was still standing awaiting a challenger as well.

" Akin to watching a Zakkeg bulldoze its way through the jungles."

" There is only one Dark Lord." A hand of arbor rose show casing the figure far in the distance. A open palm half extended towards Darth Prazutis

 

[Darth Maleva]

「i am the riot, i am the swarm」
TEMPLE OF MALACHOR
Alina Tremiru | Kalt Bruq | Quintus Varro
​

As the figure fell on her, Maleva staggered.

It was only a moment before she recovered. As the anzat regained her footing once more, her blade came up to meet the attacker. All attempts at manipulating the woman's energies were useless. The hatred that bubbled within her shifted. In an instant, the subject of her fury changed, directed inward instead. Always reliant on arcana, on her mind. Never enough brawn. Pathetic.

Maleva pushed back against the other blade clumsily. The perception of the chaos had changed with her self-loathing. The tug of danger came again, drawing her gaze momentarily to the stranger who had only just arrived. He didn't seem to blink twice as he snuffed the light within the soldier. She found it curious, but had no time to consider it.

A figure appeared in her peripheral. A mirror of the one who had assaulted her, she came forth from seemingly nowhere with little hesitation. Maleva attempted to dance out of the way, but another uncoordinated step- another mistake- put her in the line of a swipe. Black dots swam in her eyes as the pain took her. There was no time to grasp the bleeding shoulder. There was no time to attempt to return the blow. She was outnumbered, even despite their lesser power. Her own had been proved useless, her blade work as well. The doubt intensified. In the split second, she stood still, it stained everything. Five centuries of studies, only to be defeated by lesser beings. There would be no name in the history books, no fear when someone spoke her name. Only laughter, and an example of what not to be.

If someone dares doubt you, you teach them the error in their action, and make them pay for it. Even yourself, if need be. The words had been uttered so long ago, they had escaped Maleva. Yet on the battlefield, they returned. Her late master's lesson had carried her far. As her confidence grew, so too did her power. And when he had finally made the same mistake, she proved him wrong as well, taking the ultimate prize in return for his foolery. Somewhere, with time and age, Maleva had lost once more what had been found. Buried under cravings and vanity, it had been hidden in the darkness. Only now did it bare its teeth once more, offering up its ability. Teach them.

The need to punish her enemies fueled her. There was a sureness in her step, matching the sparkle in her eyes, as she moved. One hand lashed out, a quick jab moving towards the newest assailant. In the small opening the thrust created, her other arm rose. Gritting her teeth, the pain only amplified her action. With a flick of her hand, electricity crackled, aimed for the other woman.​

 

[Alina Tremiru]

OBJECTIVE 1: Survive
Location: The Temple of Malachor
Called Targets: Darth Maleva | Quintus Varro
Allies In Vicinity: Sith Empire | Kalt Bruq ​

The illusion had served it's purpose, but that's all it was. An illusion. Alina alone found herself engaged with Maleva, her blade sparking and sweeping in a relentless assault against the stronger Sith. Kalt's power was a good one, but far from strong enough to create a true copy of the Knight that could interact with the physical world. Another had joined the fight, pulling her apprentices attention away.

Was that..

From the corner of her eye she caught the man cutting down the troopers fighting alongside her. Quintus? Oh, there would be words about that, should he not die here. Or kill Kalt. The momentary distraction proved disastrous for the young Knight as one of her strikes was battered aside by the older woman. Lightning danced around her hand. Alina knew what came next.

She hopped backwards, bringing her saber around to try and cut the stream itself. A short burst, and she very well could of stopped it with her peculiar lightsaber. But the sustained of a Sith Lord? The initial blast was little more than weakened before it impacted with her body. Her armor protected her from being manipulated by the Force, but lightning had always been something different. Electricity burned through her body, causing her form to seize up. Tense.

Pain. That's all she felt. But her mind was focused. If she didn't strike this Sith down, how many of the Empire's forces would she kill? There were too few here to spare any kind of loss. Her rage melded with the raw determination to fight. To win, and protect those under and around her. She reached out, and all around her the Force died. Severed, disrupted.

Broken.

She fell to her knees, gasping for a moment as the stream was cut off. She could feel the burns on her body from the stream. God she hated burns. They didn't heal, not nearly fast enough. Still, she pushed herself back up, glaring from behind her mask at Maleva. Traitor. Traitor. She leaned against her staff, letting the rage fuel her on.

This Warlord needed to die.

 

[Khamul Kryze]

Engaging: Ulrich

Helm's Deep​

The plan had worked. The dragon had been caught in the volley of stone, descending down the side of the cliff as he screamed at Khamul. No doubt he would survive, but Khamul had no time to confirm the kill. As the beast fell to the depths of the cliff amid rock and obsidian, he muttered an incantation; one last act of defiance to the Mandalorian. As he drifted away, the ground behind Khamul began to arise, taking on strange humanoid forms...

His opponent was truly a clever one.

Khamul felt himself growing weary for a moment. This fight had taken a lot out of him, but he wasn't ready to give up. He cut the first few down with his lightsaber, slicing through rock and bone as they came at him one by one. In the end, there were too many for him to keep it up. He had to get himself away from these creatures, and away from the landslide. Mustering all of his rage once more, Khamul reached out through the Force. He only had one option, and he had to get it right.

He pictured a pathway through the falling rubble in his mind. If the timing were off by just a moment, he would likely be joining the dragon at the bottom of the cliff. Khamul took a couple of steps back, cutting down three more of the creatures as he did so. Then, with one last push of power, Khamul leapt with all of his might, using the Force to once again propel him forward. His timing was close, and he almost got clipped by a boulder as flew through the air. Luckily, he managed to make it to the other side, rolling forward to get even further away from the debris. As he landed, the undead creatures followed him relentlessly, finding themselves being taken away by the collapsing cliffside as it continued to crumble. Eventually, the landslide stopped, and Khamul took a breath.

As he rose to his feet, Khamul looked toward the chasm, wondering how long it would take for the beast to lick his wounds. The dragon's words echoed in his mind with a cacophonous howl. As his breathing slowed, Khamul muttered under his breath.

"Well then, it seems that I'll just have to conquer death itself."

He began making his way back to the battle, lightsaber still in hand. There were still enemies that needed to die, and he wasn't going to miss out on the beautiful slaughter.

"Until next time, dragon. Until next time..."

 

[Quintus Varro]

He'd been allowing himself to continually be drawn into curiosity, and it was damning him the entire way. Another Sith now stood across from him as Quintus actions had set his path colliding into the conflict. The ship now was a pointless idea, he'd stepped into it now rather foolishly. Still though, if he was here and it was all going to hell anyway here was a chance to test himself against another Sith. If it was too late to back out and escape the only choice was to make it through then.

Stepping forward he gripped the chains of the force and as much as he wanted to observe the other's fight he focused on the man before him. So be it. Raising the rifle up he fired off a pair of rounds committing himself to the fight before he tossed it aside. Gripping his lance in both hands he stepped forward as he gripped the chains of the force as he let go of any option of fleeing.

Flicking an eye over to the armor pair he forced his attention away from the oddly familiar absence of the force. He just no longer had the time for it, or at least he couldn't sacrifice the attention for it.

Darth Maleva Alina Tremiru

 

[Kalt Bruq]

Noticing the lightning sparking at Alina, and the approach of the interloper, Kalt was forced to cease hiding the Knight's presence in the force. Although he would keep his projection of her going. So long as he had the force to feed it, it would keep doing what it was programmed to do, continuing to swipe and attack the dark lord as a distraction for the real Alina. In the mean time, Kalt would focus on the new individual. He deflected the two blaster bolts roughly, the bolts firing wildly into the battle around them. Had he really pressed with the blaster he might have accidentally flung some toward Alina, or toward another soldier of the Empire.

His opponent readied his lance, and Kalt responded with an overhead swing and thrust, his stance betraying a Makashi lightsaber form. After the strikes he pulled back, allowing his opponent to attempt to strike back, looking to see if how aggressive he was. It was Kalt's hope that he would be able to defend himself and counter with a disarming counter-attack once he had learned enough. If not, he would lean on some illusions to give him more of an advantage. "A bit brave to interrupt an ongoing duel between masters of the dark side." He said out loud toward the stranger, largely to provoke some response or distract him.

[ Alina Tremiru , Darth Maleva, Quintus Varro ]​