"Magnum Praeceptum."
The holofeed stuttered, then sharpened into a screaming banner.
» SHOCKBOXING TOURNAMENT «
Prize of 100,000 Underworld Credits, a Personal Apartment on Port Nowhere and a Black Crown <<
THE RING IS LIVE. THE CROWD IS RABID. THE FLOOR IS ELECTRIFIED.
A sizzle of audio: metallic thunder, chanting, the deep, hungry pulse of a thousand heartbeats synced by bass. An announcer with a voice like rust-soaked velvet: "Gladiators, brawlers, and glory-seekers—Tapani Arts and Sports Complex, Vycinyth. The Franchise presents, under Game Patron Rathmar Praji, the galaxy's first official Shockboxing Tournament. Every punch amplified by gauntlets. Every misstep through ten thousand volts. This isn't just a fight—it's a spectacle."
Elara watched it twice. Then she muted the room into a quiet that felt like intention.
The Black Crown. An aurodium coin stamped with the sigil everyone pretended not to recognize in polite company. On the reverse, the engraving of a vigo—one of them—who would, by custom older than her parents, extend protection and privilege to its bearer. Slay a crowned friend of Black Sun and you bought your own execution. It wasn't a law in the usual sense of the word. It was heavier.
And because it was heavy, it could balance things.
On her desk, a wireframe of Vandelhelm's orbital shipyards rotated with cold precision—each ring a million jobs, each berth a promise to ten times as many. On the star map, the Stygian Caldera glowed red, little flags of the Imperial Confederation inching like blight. The Sith Order's shadow fell long across routes that brushed Vandelhelm like a hand hovering above a throat. If the High Republic's quarrel with Black Sun flared into open warfare here, the Order would come to "secure" the yards and the lanes and the future. Someone else's sigil would be stamped on her home.
Elara exhaled through her nose. Respectful. Kind. That had always been the mask. The truth lived in her spine: a steel that only acknowledged obstacles to measure them. The Crown could make Black Sun listen. The Crown could turn an incinerator switch into a dimmer. It would buy conversations, corridors, delays. Maybe even a chance at peace.
That was the difference between war and surviving it.
A Black Crown.
