Duel Galactic Kaggath Quarterfinals: Mercy vs Drystan Creed

[Mauve du Vain]

x

The boiling lava forming the surface of the arena began to hiss and steam.

“LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, ARE YOU READY TO BEGIN THE THIRD ROUND?”

The hissing grew louder, the steam now rising in voluminous clouds, concealing the entire surface of the arena behind a condensation layer so thick it appeared like a sauna.

A sudden geyser of water burst from the midst of the arena and the sound of rushing water became overpowering. As the steam dissipated, it revealed that the lava had cooled and hardened, but was swiftly disappearing beneath a lake of water.

“What you are seeing is four MILLION gallons of salt water pumped into the arena. And those cages being lowered in… Yyes those are in fact mutated firaxan sharks!”

The beasts thrashed wildly before they were let loose from cages and splashed into the water.

Hoverfreighters lowered huge platforms onto the surface of the water, which floated placidly.

“BEHOLD! THE GREAT PLANET OF MANAAN AND ITS FLOATING CITIES!”

The not-Marka Ragnos announcer zoomed around on a hover pod, holding something aloft in his hands.

“AND ITS SEAS….” He snapped the vial and tossed it down into the water far below. A thick, pungent green ichor spilled out from the vial and began to pollute the surface of the arena lake. “POISONED!”

“YES, THAT’S RIGHT, THIS ROUND REPRESENTS THE BATTLE OF MANAAN AND ALL THOSE WHO FOUGHT AND DIED THERE SO LONG AGO!”

Smaller buoys bobbed in the midst of the lake, strange bundles attached to them.

“EVEN A SMALL DIP IN THE LAKE MEANS CERTAIN DEATH… BUT THERE ARE SOME ANTIDOTES, CONVENIENTLY BUOYED ACROSS THE ARENA! USE RESPONSIBLY, THERE’S ONLY FOUR!.”

Of course, the contestants could also use abilities to purge the toxins from their system too, but where was the fun in announcing that to the audience?

"FACING OFF ACROSS THE PLATFORM, YOU HAVE SEEN HER SMASH HER WAY THROUGH THE COMPETITION, IT'S THE INDOMITABLE MERCY! AND HER OPPONENT, THE JEDI WITH FISTS LIKE THUNDER, DRYSTAN CREEEEEEEED!"

“LET THE QUARTER FINALS OF THE GALACTIC KAGGATH, BEGIN!”

Mercy | Drystan Creed

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

Fists of thunder?

Drystan held back a smirk at the announcer's description of him, now hidden beneath the visage of his helmet. For it was not the thunder one should fear in the heart of a storm—it was the lightning it heralded.

He eyed the toxic lake below them, noting that he would prefer to avoid any skin contact with it. The enviro-filters in his armor were inadequate for prolonged submersion, but he could fall back on the nexus if needed. He'd rather not, however, as tapping into that source remained a foreign strategy—he had only managed to use it to heal his wounds during the intermission.

"If we fought a round or two ago, I would have met you as a martial artist," Drystan said, his voice crackling through the helmet's voice modulator. "But I have chosen to see this tournament through as a Shadow."

He raised an open palm, then brought it down—planting it onto the platform floor as he channeled the Force. Honor was thrown to the wayside, and in its place: Cold and brutal precision.

KRAKOW!

Without warning, the clouds parted as four bolts of golden lightning split the sky—one on each side of the platform, missing the edges by mere inches. The results were immediate: a toxic, obscuring fog crept across the arena, a reaction caused by vaporized traces of the poisoned water.

The effect was twofold—first, to obscure Drystan's form within the thick haze; second, to turn the tainted lake into airborne toxins that could be inhaled. Not that it bothered him—his suit's enviro-filter allowed him to breathe without purging any impurities or suffering ill effects.

His saber remained unignited as he stalked his side of the platform, a predator lying in ambush, hidden within the mist.

Mercy

Spoiler: Equipment and Implants

• A pair of stock-standard blaster pistols.
• 2x blue lightsabers modified with the FFS- A.D.A.P.T Saber Kit and a blue amplification kyber crystal, 2x Hurrikaine crystal
• A grapnel launcher.
• An FFS Utility Belt
• FFS Force User Battle Armor
• A custom made prosthetic- Phrik internals, cortosis plating, reflec, emp-shielding and a built in laser system similar in concept to lightsaber rifles using one of the lightsabers in Drystan's posession. It can electrify using a similar concept to an electro-staff.

 

[Mercy]

It might have taken a moment for Drystan to realize that the low, hoarse sound echoing through the arena was laughter.

Mercy's laughter.

Loud. Violent. Mocking.

It rolled across the platforms and up into the stands, and the crowd: a beast stirred to bloodlust. It began to echo it back.

The handiwork of her apprentice, no doubt.

"Thunderfist?" she called, her voice thick with venom and glee. "I name you coward."

"You fought with your fists... right up until you met someone who'd break you in half with hers. You were forward motion, until you met someone who stopped you cold, you pathetic rodent."

She grinned like a predator, baring teeth. Then breathed in the toxin-laced air. Her lungs shuddered. Her new arm twitched, curious, almost... hungry. As if it could practically taste a new victim in the fog. The copper-amber color darkened but didn't shift. Not yet. She had dubbed it Thronegrasp. An echo towards the understanding she had gleamed in the bacta tank between the two rounds.

Her body wanted to cough. Expel the foreign gas. Instead, she inhaled deeper. The Force began to stir inside of her. Writhing. Uncoiling.

Drystan needed a suit. He needed armor. Filters. A battlefield sculpted to his advantage. She had been looking forward to a real fight. Flesh and bone. Blood and sweat. Instead in her disappointment she realized he was just a metal toy like the rest of them. They all seemed to need something to be able to even grasp her heights. And that made them pretenders, unworthy of anything but scorn.

Mercy was whole. She needed only her body. And it was already adapting to the toxic fumes. She had inhaled poison directly and then force-killing gas, it had ravaged her from within, but she managed to press through even without the Force. Ever since then her body had become hardier. Tougher. Something about her arm ripping itself apart and becoming more.

"I give you one chance to shake your cowardice and to face me like a true warrior. If you don't, I will break you and there will be no coming back from it."

She didn't attack yet. In her own strange way Mercy had rules she followed, she would give him a chance to prove himself worthier than the ones she left behind in the last rounds.

Drystan Creed

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

Mercy's speech was met with silence. Correspondence through words could no longer be accommodated, nor would the challenge be answered in the way she might have hoped. Drystan had long since discarded the notion of this being a fight. It was now a mission—and he would approach it with the professionalism of an operative. Activating the thermal sensors in his helmet, he took his first step.

He folded his presence into the surroundings, deadening himself to the senses. He timed each movement with the ambient sounds: the murmurs of the crowd, the rolling waves of the lake below, the cries of the announcers as other matches were called. Each footstep was deliberately placed to coincide with another noise, helping mask his intent.

Hiding from sight, he maneuvered through the storm-forged fog, rotating toward perceived blind spots and zigzagging through the densest pockets of haze. His lightsaber remained unignited to maintain the veil of obscurity.

Each step, each stride toward his opponent, held to these principles with precision.

What Drystan had displayed in the earlier rounds were explorations of specific aspects of his martial discipline, self-imposed constraints to refine his technique within that aspect. But now, those limitations were lifted. His last match had shifted his priorities. The desire to win had supplanted the desire to learn.

And with that shift, he would use everything he had. Including what he did best.

Closing the distance between them, Drystan dropped into a low stance—unnaturally low. The Force gathered into a singular focus within his mind: speed.

For speed and stealth shared the same domain. To move before being noticed was, in every sense, an act of the covert.

He channeled this principle into his body, flooding his legs with power—and unleashed. Drystan shot forward in a dash, a blur of black slicing toward Mercy. He kept pace with the sound of his own footfalls, saber still in hand.

This wasn't just speed—it was efficiency. The Force moved through his muscles in precise succession, each one activating in perfect synchronization, wasting no effort. His stride was flawless: each footfall landed beneath his center of mass, knees driving upward and forward, posture tight and optimized to maintain momentum.

The only word to describe the maneuver was meticulous. Even at a blinding pace, every motion served a purpose—no more, no less. Like a machine in perfect calibration.

His aim: a lateral strike to her torso. The saber ignited at the last possible moment—just a brief flash of blue in the mist—then vanished just as quickly.

Whether the blow landed or not, he would then attempt to vanish back into the dense fog.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Drystan Creed

She had been angry in the first round. Annoyed in the second round. Round three found Mercy just disappointed and mildly miffed. It almost felt like someone was specifically screwing with her. Was it Ashin Cardé Varanin ? Mercy had noticed shew as part of the jury. Maybe it was her wife, Spencer Varanin 's hand, meddling. Making sure she would not have a match that truly sated and satisfied her.

Maybe it was just fate.

Regardless Drystan didn't respond at all. Fine. If he would act like prey, act like a rodent, then he'd be hunted like one.

Her arm, coiled, sleek gold and burnished copper twitched behind her. Like liquid metal. In response something passed through the veil. Once upon a time the arm had been cursed and enchanted. It could summon starweirds into the world without her say so. In the last match her arm had burst out and something else had taken control of Mercy. At least until the yslamiri field disappeared. An agreement was reached in a bacta tank. It was not peaceful, it was a continued struggle, but for now there was equilibrium.

Mercy had given Drystan a chance. To be something more than a cowardly ghost in the fog. To face her head on.

She reached out now as she waited for the coming strike. The feeling of wings displacing the air behind her. Quiet presence filling and breathing in the richness of Ruusan. They had never experienced power like this. In their reality the Force was a dim noise. Here amidst the Nexus it was everywhere and they softly trilled at being invited here.

They were hunger. Claws, sharp teeth, endless strength.

The moment Drystan leaped in, he wouldn't find Mercy alone. The creatures swept in from around her, immediately throwing themselves at the force user. And even as the lightsaber ignited, biting into her shoulder but not cutting through, Mercy abused his sudden proximity. She didn't try to deflect and instead went for his footing.

Forcing him to stumble with a shattering of the ground right where he stepped.

Her shoulder burned, white hot. She absorbed the burn but it was agony regardless. Blood would be extracted from a cowardly rat by hungry teeth and dark shapes in the fog.

 

[Razmir Tezhyn]

It turned out that, on a desert planet, a lot of folks enjoyed technologically advanced methods of cooling in the form of fan-droids. Their only purpose : to float behind the individuals who bought them and keep them cool with a nice and gentle breeze. They'd been peddled by a pair of enterprising Ithorians outside the arena. Sold practically two hover-truck loads.

Now, Yeza the Chiss Slicer had been handed a generous amount of credits to unleash a small plague of those floating fan droids on the arena to appease a most aggrieved Sith ( Ashin Cardé Varanin ). Slicing into their motivators was exceedingly simple. Bypassing the safety precautions to overclock the fans was, too.

The swarm of fan droids left their owners behind to rally where Drystan Creed and Mercy battled. Their combined power made quick work of the mists. It took only a few moments, and dozens of fan-droids, for the audience to once more be able to enjoy the wonderful bloodshed on display with minimal visual interference.

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

Well, this was unexpected.

Drystan's strike had managed to clip Mercy, but with the sudden appearance of the Starweirds and the loss of his footing, this could have spelled a quick end for any Jedi. But for Drystan, situations like this were his specialty. He bent backward to avoid the swipe of a claw, shifting his weight onto his legs into a springboard kick—launching off as another creature came at him. He landed, ready to retreat back into the—

CRASH!

He stumbled as the stomp shook the ground beneath him, the floor crumbling from underneath. But he used the tremor to his advantage, compressing into a roll and propelling himself away with a smooth tuck, narrowly recovering as the clawed and fanged beasts chased after him.

He would have disappeared into the fog—if it hadn't been swept away by the fan droids. A bribe, by the look of it. The first time he'd experienced something like that mid-fight. Now it was three against one.

A mental shrug. The odds could be worse.

Still, with the fog gone, he was at least free to do this...

He stood firm across from Mercy and the Weirds as the Weirds flanked and charged. When they lunged, he didn't move. He crossed his arms as the Force swelled around him, the ground vibrating with a low hum—similar to Mercy's stomp, but more refined, more focused.

At the center of the technique was stillness—a pond, undisturbed.

Drystan took a breath, unphased by the prospect of being torn apart. He waited as the Weirds gave chase, silent and unmovable as stone.

Then he dropped the metaphorical stone into his pond.

"HAAA!"

Like the previous round, this technique was a product of synthesis—but not of martial disciplines. This was a union of the Force.

First came the expanding telekinetic ripple, with himself as the epicenter, unleashed through a sudden, explosive movement of his arms.

Then came the breath, channeled into a Force-enhanced yell that amplified the wave's concussive force—pushing, thrashing, breaking.

The effects were immediate and potent, unleashed in the span of a half-moment. The blast would reach throughout the platform, its strength most concentrated at the epicenter. Drystan stood at its heart, barely a bead of sweat on his brow.

Drystan's path was not of raw power, but of refined precision. A masterwork of controlled devastation, designed with minimal waste and maximum effect.

And this technique was a perfect embodiment of that philosophy.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Drystan Creed

The winged creatures seemed to put Creed on the backfoot for just a moment.

The fog lifted and cleared entirely all of a sudden. Mercy glanced around, confused, before spotting the multitude of fan droids blowing away the toxic fumes. She breathed in fresh air again. She hadn't realized how bad it was until she filled her lungs with clean air.

The creatures continued their assault on her opponent. With the fog gone, they had a clear line of sight. Mercy squinted as she saw him drop into a waiting stance. She could practically feel the Force gather there for... something.

Mercy growled and immediately set toward him. She launched herself into the air, intent on crushing him from above. Her arm ripped into tendrils, reshaping into a crude shield-like mass in front of her. All her fury focused on crushing the little man beneath her weight and the Force. It had worked, partially, on the droid. But the toaster hadn't been fending off eldritch creatures engineered to tear it apart.

The scream came as a surprise.

It burst outward from the lad and tore two of the creatures apart immediately. The others drew back, reassessing. Mercy didn't have that luxury. She drove through the Force Scream head-on, her crude shield tearing a path through the shock-wave. Her ears bled. Her teeth clenched as she felt her jaw crack under the pressure.

The wave tore past her, and still she roared, meeting it with force of her own. She came crashing down on the warrior. Her shield burst apart, tendrils uncoiling again, glowing faintly with a strange blue light as they drove toward Drystan to rip into him. To rip him apart and devour him whole.

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

The repulsive force he unleashed came and went in an instant. However, he hadn't expected Mercy to be so daring—to leap straight into the epicenter of it. No way of avoiding this in time.

He raised his left arm, letting the tendrils overtake it, wrap around it, and dig in. He formed a guard, willingly sacrificing his left arm to buy himself a moment, using its extended range to stave the tendrils off. His heels grounded firmly against the surface of the platform, muscles contracting at the moment of impact to absorb the blow, keeping faith in his armor and form to withstand the tide. He used the ground itself as another plane, his entire body acting as a conduit between it and Mercy—transferring part of the impact into the floor below.

His bones creaked and rattled. Muscles strained to keep from being crushed entirely. He grit his teeth. The pressure was immense—he couldn't move without risking being torn apart. There was no other recourse now but to use… that.

Damn. I was hoping to save this for later… but I have no choice.

There had been a deliberate reason for using his left arm. The tendrils would dig into the gaps of its armor and find metal—his prosthetic, forged from phrik and cortosis. Even without the Force, it could withstand all but the most devastating attacks. But its strength wasn't only in its durability—it was also an engine of destruction.

His palm opened. Fingers spread wide, forming a claw as the joints locked into place to maintain the position. Drystan tilted slightly, aiming for center mass.

From his open palm, a node began to glow a dangerous blue. Even through the mass of tendrils wrapping around it, the radiance glared brightly into the cameras trained on the fight, blinding them.

WOOSH!

A massive, piercing blue ray launched from the node—wide as his palm, moving with the speed of a lightsaber's ignition. And rightly so—the source of power was, in fact, a lightsaber. Embedded within the forearm of his prosthetic was his second blade, repurposed as an energy core to fire this devastating plasma beam.

The intent was simple: to burn through the tendrils, punch a hole through them, and force Mercy back. Enough to break free. Enough to reset the board, regain distance, and devise countermeasures against the writhing mass.

He was outnumbered but not outgunned.

Mercy

 

[Razmir Tezhyn]

Je'ames the Duro hit the button which lowered the freighter's cargo ramp right as the dingy, beat-up freighter approached the Kaggath arena. He watched his two underlings carefully move their packages into position.

"Je'ames, this is a waste of good product," one of the underlings complained.

"We receive the decs, we take care of business. Just toss it, capisce?" Je'ames replied.

With some grumbling protests the underlings moved the large stack of packages right onto the edge of the loading ramp. Then they waited until the freighter made a low-pass above the arena battlegrounds. The freighter flew a slow circle. The underlings began to toss the cargo in large chunks. Dozens of neatly wrapped packages fell free, then burst mid-air to scatter glitterstim over the dueling grounds.

Glitterstim was a potent variety of the drug family "spice" that was mined on Kessel. It gave the user a brief, yet pleasurable, telepathic boost and heightened mental state.

Once they were done, the freighter left the air space again. In its wake, a translucent blue cloud that sparked with harmless blue electricity covered the 'Seas of Manaan'. The cloud rolled over the waters, potentially engulfing everyone. Not even the first few rows of onlookers were spared the telepathic hallucinogenic's effects.

Mercy Drystan Creed

 

[Mercy]

Drystan Creed Razmir Tezhyn

The tendrils of her arm managed to snatch Drystan's prosthetic and began to tear, doing its best to try and wrench it out of his arm socket.

At least until that shining light began to pour out of his arm.

Several tendrils jumped back, planning to jam into his helmet instead and try to shatter his visor before digging into his face. But it was too late as the blast of the prosthetic suddenly erupted from that light. They instantly ripped through some of the tendrils nearby and would have blasted Mercy straight through the heart if she hadn't jumped back. Instead that blast ran wide and she escaped getting her head cleaved straight off.

Mercy didn't notice the glitterstim falling down on them, but as she breathed in to rush right back towards Drystan... she felt... funny. Mid-step she faltered as the chemical hit her brain like a hammer. Just as with the poisons, she didn't have the benefit of armor filtering out the toxins, the way that Drystan did.

So while he'd be able to dodge the effects Mercy felt it all.

The area around them erupted into bright lights. Her brain reeled. The world bloomed into fractal lights, luminous and endless, like a thousand auroras trapped underwater.

Mercy didn't know the first thing about mentalism. Her thoughts had always been a black box, sealed, instinctive, savage. Penetrable, yes, but never expressive. A little hit of glitterstim could open your mind to project something out. But Mercy didn't get a little hit. She got slammed in the face with a motherlode quantity of chemicals. Enough to make a normal person overdose. Mercy wasn't normal though, instead it just carved a lane through her neural pathways that none ought to walk.

Her mind cracked like an egg, and what poured out wasn't thought at all. It was violence, murder, bloody images and tearing sounds in the night. A surge of emotion, memory, hunger, and sensation. Violence layered on violence, an unbroken reel of brutality played across the arena like psychic static. A stark contrast to her simply giggling at the beautiful lights all around her at the same time. Even as she began to effect all those around her, starting with the closest first.

Drystan would feel it the keenest. First a pressure at the edge of his awareness, then a pounding at the door. Not words. Not images. Just need. Pure, skinless desire to break. To crush. To dominate. A presence clawing into his psyche, shoving itself past his mental guard not to steal information but to reform him.

The horror was not in being hurt. It was in realizing how natural it felt. As if this was the right shape. As if the violence had always been there, and Mercy just helped you remember.

The crowd was not spared either.

Those near the front went to their knees as they were hit with the double whammy of Mercy's opened mind and the glitter-stim from above. Some wept. One empathic spectator vomited as their mind collapsed beneath the raw weight of Mercy's unfettered consciousness and having their mind simultaneously forced open by the chemicals.

She took a single step forward, golden tendrils twitching behind her, giggling again.

Her mind was still open. Still pouring. And every second she remained under the glitterstim's effect, that broadcast would only grow louder.

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

The shot hit its mark. Not a perfect outcome—but ideal enough. Drystan managed to roll away, creating distance, landing on one knee as countermeasures began constructing themselves in his head. The situation was far from favorable, but not outside expectation.

What was unexpected was the glitterstim.

His recovery paused the moment he saw the blue smoke begin to waft through the arena. He recognized it instantly—glitterstim. He'd encountered a smaller cloud of it in the previous round. This was different. Denser. Heavier. Weaponized.

Thankfully, his helmet's envirofilters kicked in, purifying the air before it reached his lungs. Another bribe, but not his—and judging by the spread, everyone was meant to be affected.

Drystan gripped his saber and began to rise—

CLANK!

No. His body buckled, his knee collapsing beneath him against his will. That full-body tackle from Mercy had strained him more than he'd accounted for. Even with his guard up, the force of it had rattled through muscle and bone.

He drew a shallow breath. Then another. Steel entered his gaze as he willed his body upright, rising once more.

And then came the pressure.

A violent, crushing aura surged through the air, tunneling directly into his mind. It bore Mercy's signature—unmistakable. Intense feelings of carnage. Bloodlust. The overwhelming desire to destroy and dominate. It froze him for a moment, his eyes widening behind the visor.

But no one could see the look in his eyes.

No one could hear what he felt—except for the words that slipped past his lips, quietly:

"I see."

There was something in his voice. A shift. A faint, unshakable smile beneath the helmet.

He understood.

"Come, then," he said, stepping forward. "Let us have our fill."

The psychic wave had affected him. On some level, he saw something of himself in that aura she cast over the arena—something raw. Something honest.

His lightsaber hissed to life, casting a brilliant azure into the thickening haze.

Drystan no longer sought to "win" this round.

He sought to "defeat" Mercy.

A single step became a blur—a dash that tore through the battlefield. Above, the sky split once more.

Another bolt of lightning screamed down from the heavens, this time aimed directly overhead Mercy's position. Whether it struck true or not didn't matter.

Drystan was already moving to intercept—anticipating her next move, closing in on where she'd flee or pivot.

And there he would be—to meet her—his blade surging upward in a fierce, precise arc, ready to carve through the opening she left behind.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Drystan Creed

Except that Mercy didn't move away at all.

She glanced up at the sky and smiled, her expression soft and distant, like someone watching fireworks. The lightning above fractured into a whirl of color only she could see. In that moment Mercy knew that the storm wasn't danger. It was art that was almost as beautiful as the works she did with her fists and knives. It shimmered, danced towards her. It tempted Mercy to reach for it, fingers stretched, wanting to feel the colors on her skin because something so beautiful would probably feel even better.

While her mind wandered, her arm recognized what she could not.

The eldritch limb, always coiled in waiting, reacted. It twisted upward, intercepting the bolt just before it could fry her to the bone. Her body lit up in the next instant, a column of raw power channeling through her. The energy didn't just strike her. Instead it filled her like water filled thirst. Lit her like an x-ray and showed the exquisite artpiece that Mercy had made herself to be. Bones flashed and nerves flared. Her skin blistered, peeled while blood boiled in her veins.

It should have killed her.

But the arm forced her to absorb the lightning instead.

It burned her from the inside as if she had swallowed liquid fire. And Mercy... Mercy just laughed. A high, cracked sound. But there was no pained laced through her voice, no madness. There was simple joy because the colors were inside her now.

The laughter didn't last. Her legs gave out. She dropped to her knees, her body smoking, eyes wide and glassy. Her arm was hidden behind her back, out of view.

Drystan was already moving in for the strike. He had been planning to strike her wherever she landed... in the end she had landed exactly where she had started.

Her flesh was open and vulnerable.

But the liquid arm was not.

It tore upward from behind her, fast and violent. It split into tendrils that fanned outward and interwove mid-air. A metal web, gleaming copper and gold, spun high above her like a trap laid by a spider. Each strand pulsed with the lightning it had stolen.

As Drystan closed the distance, the web ignited.

Every tip burst outward with chained bolts of Force lightning. They didn't strike him immediately. Instead, they would converge around him like a cage of crackling light to trap the fast and agile hunter. Then they began to snap at him, each strike bursting out to rip into him, from every which direction to destroy him.

Mercy however didn't move. Her eyes remained half-lidded, her lips slack with the shadow of a smile.

"Oh, those colors are also pretty..." Now the lightning was right in front of her.

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

Another hit—clean, but far from decisive. He should have expected it. Mercy was tough—tougher than he'd fully accounted for. He hadn't yet adjusted his tactics to reflect her sheer endurance.

And then there was that arm. Could it even be called an arm anymore?

Well, it didn't matter—because now it wasn't an arm at all. Not as Drystan found himself trapped in the thick of an eldritch web.

Instinct took over. He raised his guard immediately, angling the plates, pauldrons, and guards of his armor to shield his vitals and tendons as best he could. The protection worked—partially. Tendrils slashed across the exposed gaps in his armor, drawing blood—but it kept him from being skewered outright. Those aimed for his vital points scraped and sparked against reinforced plating, deflected just enough to spare him.

But the worst was yet to come.

The web lit up with power—arcing lightning through its tangled mass.

His muscles seized.

Electric current surged through him, locking his limbs and rattling his bones. His armor saved him from total incineration—kept him from becoming a charred skeleton—but the clock was ticking. He wouldn't survive another wave without acting.

Escape was a luxury he couldn't afford. He was too deep in, and his muscles refused to obey. No, he couldn't flee.

But he could strike back.

First came focus. He let go—not of the pain, but of resistance. He stopped fighting the current, stopped struggling against it. Instead, he became the conduit. The lightning, once his enemy, now flowed through him. He opened himself to it—let it course through his body, through the Force.

His left arm shot forward.

EMP shielding kept the prosthetic functional, but the strain on the surrounding muscles made the movement sluggish. Still, he pushed through, aiming straight for Mercy.

All or nothing.

The lightning around and within him vanished—gathered in silence—before erupting in his right palm, glowing brilliant and electric blue. He concentrated it there, containing a storm's worth of power in the eye of his hand.

And without hesitation, he slammed that palm into his left forearm. Armored glove met phrik-reinforced alloy with a resounding crack—aligning the barrel.

It was time for another act of synthesis. In the previous round, it was martial synthesis. This time: Force and technology. Nature and artifice.

Lightning flooded the prosthetic, coursing through its internals, surging toward the palm-mounted node. Its glow intensified, blinding the nearby camera droids, searing the retinas of any who dared to look directly at it. Power coalesced—pure, wrathful, incandescent.

KRAKOW!

A beam fired. But not like before.

This one was imbued with the Force—charged with primal lightning. Massive. Roaring. Alive. It arced with streaks of electricity, searing across the battlefield in a monstrous pillar of devastation. It melted metal and stone, scorched ground, and split the air with thunderous fury.

It wasn't just a weapon. It was his fighting spirit given form.

And it came at a price. His prosthetic began to glow red-hot. His right palm burned, even through the melting armor and thermal padding. His nerves screamed—then fell silent, going numb.

This wasn't just a blast. This was Drystan's will—made manifest, his refusal to fall, his defiance shouted fearlessly.

And he would ensure it was witnessed by all.

Mercy

 

[Mauve du Vain]

A mysterious bribe.

It was given to Mauve with a smile and the credits necessary. There was an extra one placed carefully in case the Zeltron wanted to keep one for herself.

The small droid was packed with the gift, along with a note attached. Carefully, it navigated through the dangerous field filled with glitterstim and grit, searching for its target. Once hovering near the fire-headed fighter, it dropped its contents.

Temptation and scandal were evident in the photographs of a certain potentially annoying Echani princess, accompanied by a simple note.

Knave - you're not allowed to die, that honor is mine and mine alone. Though if you win, I'll treat you to that all-you-can-eat BBQ buffet on Nar Shaddaa you love.

~Quinn ♡

Mercy Drystan Creed

 

[Mercy]

Drystan Creed Quinn Varanin

The oscillating colors shimmered right in front of her now.

Bouncing back and forth, hitting Drystan in the middle of it, and it was a great show for Mercy. She breathed out, satisfied. A soft buzzing distracted her, now there was a drone. She reached out absently and caught the package as it dropped into her palm. It was not that heavy, eyes fixated on it for a moment, but it was hard with the color show right in front of her. There was a note attached.

Wait, why was her nose bleeding?

"Princess... you are such a pain... luckily I relish it."

Amber eyes fixated for a moment longer before pushing it into her pocket. This was not the time. She knew that instinctively. It was a good thing her head reared up in time.

"Oh, shiny..." Her tone was starting to verge back into normalcy, but her arm twitched, trying to decline the command she was foisting on it with prejudice. In the end it lost. "I want it." The moment that Creed's prosthetic powered up fully, the color of it was at its shiniest and most brilliant. It was too much for Mercy to ignore.

Just as the cannon reached full charge, the eldritch arm surged forward. The tendrils crossing the distance but not to yank or tear at the arm again like last time. Instead they forced their way inside right where the light was coming from. Liquid metal, burning with a blue hue the same shade that Mercy's entire body was now glowing, corrupting and closing the opening of the cannon.

Then came the explosion.

It wasn't clean. The light flared too fast, too wide, and cracked the air like a whip. The shockwave hit Mercy full-on. It didn't matter that she used the technique perfected by her Master. Even through the protective aura the explosion, caused by clogging up the prosthetic and preventing it from firing properly, sent her flying backward. She tried to pivot, but the force still tore her across the platform as the blast scattered molten sparks through the air.

It could have been worse though. If not for that glow, half her body would be missing. The ache in her bones told her just how much pressure the technique had absorbed. Mercy realized she might have to thank Ashin later, that disgusted her.

Her boots skidded to a stop near the edge of the platform, smoke trailing off her frame. Her jaw was clenched. Blood ran from one nostril. Hair curled from heat. She blinked at the magnitude of destruction but then grinned widely.

She did say, after all... that she wanted to touch the colors.

 

[Drystan Creed]

ROUND 3

As the smoke from the plasma blast dissipated, Drystan stood upright—his expression unreadable.

He raised his prosthetic. Sparks flickered from within the internal mechanisms. Though the alloy frame remained sturdy, the finer parts—the gears, joints, and precision servos—had been compromised. Mercy's tendrils had wormed their way into the arm during the blast, clogging the internals. Motor function remained mostly intact, but the arm's ranged capabilities were sabotaged.

Still, something about that supply drop to Mercy felt odd. He had no reason to believe it was intended to aid him, yet it didn't seem to help her either. Strange. He hadn't requested any bribes. No outside assistance in previous rounds. But he wasn't going to question a gift droid's internals.

He flexed his left hand—servos still functioning. Then his right. Burnt nerves left it numb, but it was still usable. Blood pooled in the seams of his armor where her tendrils had struck true. Each breath stung. Every motion ached. His bones groaned under the strain.

But Drystan had been in enough battles to read the timeline. And this one was drawing to its close. While the end was near, the conclusion was still only for the eyes of fate.

His eyes dropped once more to his prosthetic. The internal firing system was likely compromised—beyond field repair. One more blast could backfire, violently. It was a gamble now—more roulette than tactic.

Any combination of these injuries would've brought another man to his knees or worse. But the Shadow stood resolute, burying pain, fatigue, and stress beneath a mask of cold, calculating focus.

Oddly enough, this wasn't the worst shape he'd been in during the tournament. That honor belonged to the previous round. Physically, at least. But this fight? It was draining. Even with his full arsenal, Mercy devoured every trick he offered—and remained standing.

He scoffed. So much for strategy. The hunt had become a brawl.

"Still standing?" he muttered, eyes narrowing at the figure across the platform.

His saber snapped to his hand. He gripped it tight, using the Force to reinforce the hold where damaged fingers faltered. The blade ignited with a hiss.

And once again, he willed himself forward.

Mind focused to its absolute. Only one task to attend to.

Overcome.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Drystan Creed

Mercy breathed out and her shoulders shuddered for a moment before she got a hold of herself. One arm was ruined, more tendril than metal now, twitching every once in a while at the end. The other had several carved wounds deeply embedded in it. Blood from her nose. Deep carves where metal shrapnel from the explosion passed her thigh.

She spit on the ground in front of her. It was blood and spittle... and a tooth?

It only seemed to bring a pep to her step, smirking as she glanced up to Drystan. "You're not the first to think he will be the one." Then a soft shrug, a flex of her shoulders that ended in a wince that she didn't try to hide.

In a way it was its own trophy. Pain sustained through aggressive resistance and sacrifice. If you came out of a fight without it, you didn't commit hard enough to it.

"But you think too highly of yourself." Her tone was devoid of irony. It was slightly funny coming from someone like Mercy, whose every move was theatrical and who absorbed the spotlight like a sunflower devoured rays of light. But Mercy didn't register it, instead just stated like a fact that should be self-evident.

Eyes flicked down to the ignited lightsaber.

The little smirk began to grow wider... until it bloomed into an almost maniacal grin.

Yes. She hissed with enough force that more blood-spittle dropped to the ground. "Finally... finally ready to be a warrior, boy." Her arms, one a mass of burned and twitching tendrils, the other carved and burned meat, extended in an invitation.

"Show me what you are made of."