Connel Vanagor
Matsu continued to lead the way as they were going through the galleries. She could see other aspects... other scenes playing out showing the temples of the jedi aas she breathed and the air shifted. "Connel." She said it less as a worry or fear but she felt it as it shifted before it became visible. This far down she was able to see it as the area around was void and vacuum. Only the surrounding area illuminated by their presence more then any other light that might have been there. She could feel it in the air as it vibrated. There was many things here and it was aware of them... and if didn't care... it didn't even think of them as important enough to acknowledge.
"Jedi." The voice was like gravel on glass scraping a boarrd... crruel, malice and more wrapped into it as no form was permaanent it wouldn't be. "You." She said it and was looking at it as the being moved around them in the inky shadows not giving form but you could almost see it as something darker against the shadows. "Me... the trap the jedi set for me, the hole you and Asshin buried me, Sorel, Corvus, Iella.... Carn." He said all of it like it was a curse and Matsu was looking at him. "But most of all Rave... all of you sent me here trapped to a single dimension." His voice continued as she was looking but spoke to Connel. "That is something to be upset with. Wutzek."
There waas almost a flourish of acknowledgement at the name. The being spoke. "I knew one of you would come here, it took millions of years, a snails pace for a being like me but for you it wouldn't have been much... cause where you moved on with your life I have had only my hatred to sustain me and thoughts of revenge... and then anger shifted to rage and it began to tear at the membrane between the dimensional planes. Until finally I had a way to be free once again." He didn't laugh and Matsu was looking at him as she remained there standing. "Maybe but none of us are how we once were before and the jedi have learned better ways to face your kind." That seemed to annoy and Matsu spoke quickly one hand going out as she remained there. "A game, I challenge you to the oldest."
That seemed to make the thing angrry.. visibly showing as Matsu spoke. "By the laws of the precepts.." His voice was drowned out as the being shouted. "Do not explain the old laws to me jedi. I was there when they were written." He seemed to be moving around them and seething as he settled for a moment and Matsu never took her eyes off of him. Even looking around and through Connel as he seemed to speak. "Fine then I shall begin jedi." His voice had returned to normal.. the anger replaced with a cold furry as he seemed to be looking at them and his voice came out as the shadows shifted with rippling. She could feel the force collecting and dispersing.
"I am a loth wolf, prey-stalking, lethal prowler." The shadows in the corners of the ancient chamber curdled, knitting together into a predatory mass of fur and malice. A pair of luminous, gold-rimmed eyes ignited in the dark as the silhouette of a giant Loth-wolf paced the perimeter. The sound of heavy paws thudding against stone echoed through the Force, and a low, guttural growl vibrated in Matsu's chest. The air grew thick with the musk of a hunter, and the vision showed a blood-red moon hanging over a jagged Lothal landscape. Matsu felt her pulse quicken, her own skin prickling as if a thousand needles were pressing against her throat.
"I am a Jedi, blade-wielding, balance-keeping." Matsu stood her ground, though her breath hitched as she projected her counter-vision. Her presence expanded like a ripple in a still pond, and in the shimmering haze of the Force, a figure of light emerged, thumbing a hilt. A sapphire blade ignited, slicing through the predatory gloom with a hum that harmonized with the chamber's ancient stones. Matsu's hand tightened into a white-knuckled grip on her physical hilt, her muscles locking into a perfect defensive stance. She didn't hunt; she centered herself, her spirit becoming a geometry of discipline that turned the wolf's prowling circle into a cage of radiant light.
"I am a swampfly, jedi-stinging, sickness spreading." The wolf dissolved into a foul, buzzing cloud. Thousands of tiny, iridescent wings filled the air a living veil of filth that swarmed toward the light. The vision shifted to the choking bogs of Dagobah, where the air was heavy with rot. The swarm was a singular consciousness of decay, seeking any microscopic opening in Matsu's defenses. Matsu felt a phantom itch beneath her skin; her lungs burned as if inhaling spores, and a sudden, sharp fever spiked behind her eyes, threatening to blur her vision. She knew Connel was right, there wasn't many others beyond them who could do and handle this... she didn't kow if he waas experiencing the same.
"I am a breeze, fly-sweeping, calm-restoring." Matsu exhaled, pushing the heat of the fever out with her breath. A sudden, cool draft swept through the chamber, smelling of ozone and mountain rain. In the vision, the stagnant swamp air was purified by a rushing gale. Matsu's body relaxed, her temperature dropping as she channeled the wind. The swarm was caught in the updraft, their frantic buzzing drowned out by the cleansing whistle of the Force as they were scattered into the distance. She stood in the eye of her own storm, her robes fluttering violently in a wind only the soul could feel. She focused on the here and now and knew there was more to everything.. and worrse to come.
"I am a snake, calm-devouring, poison-toothed." From the dissipating wind, a long, rhythmic hiss emerged. A serpent of obsidian scales coiled around the pillars of the chamber, its body thick as a starship's hull. Its tongue flicked, tasting the "calm" Matsu had created and seeking to taint it. The vision pulsed with a sickly green light as the snake reared back, fangs dripping with a venom that curdled the spirit. Matsu felt a tightening around her ribs a crushing pressure that made every heartbeat an agony, as if the serpent were physically wringing the life from her lungs. Her focus on the force didn't falter... allowing the force to fill her body from the attacks.
"I am a mountain, rooted in the Force, steadfast and unyielding." Matsu sank her weight into the floor, and the temple seemed to groan in recognition. The vision transformed into the soaring peaks of Tython. The snake struck, but its fangs shattered against granite. Matsu's feet felt as heavy as lead, her legs turning to pillars of unmoving strength. She was no longer a person; she was an epoch of stone. The serpent's coils squeezed, but the mountain did not flinch. Though blood began to trickle from Matsu's nose from the internal pressure, her gaze remained fixed and obsidian-hard. She was watching the shaadows as inky and anger filled shifted.
"I am an anthrax, butcher bacterium, life destroying." The serpent didn't vanish; it rotted. It shriveled into a microscopic horror, a silent, invisible plague that saturated the molecules of the room. The vision turned gray and sterile. Plants withered in seconds; birds fell mid-flight. It was a cold, clinical genocide. Matsu's skin began to pale, turning a translucent, sickly hue. Her joints stiffened with a sudden, arthritic fire, and she felt the terrifying sensation of her very cells beginning to unravel under the weight of the force demon's necrotic will. Herr breathing hitched but she was holding it and thought of how much worse one could whether.
"I am a star, radiating light, nurturing life across the cosmos." In the center of the grey rot, a pinprick of white-hot intensity ignited in Matsu's solar plexus. Her spirit flared with the power of a binary sunrise. The vision expanded into the vacuum of space, where a golden sun poured out waves of solar wind. The ultraviolet grace of the star scoured the bacteria away. Matsu's body began to glow, light leaking from her eyes and mouth as she burned the infection clean. The agony of the plague was replaced by the searing, purifying heat of a sun, leaving her gasping but renewed. She was rising up and her silver robes gleamed with the light as it reflected aand was absorbed into the shadows.
"I am a nova, all-exploding, planet-cremating." The demon's laughter sounded like the cracking of a world. The golden sun in the vision began to swell, turning a violent, bruised purple. It groaned under its own gravity before shattering outward in a cataclysmic shockwave. The chamber walls cracked as the vision showed entire civilizations vaporizing. Matsu was flung backward by a psychic concussive wave, her back hitting the stone wall with a sickening thud. Her vision swam with sparks, her ears ringing as the "heat" of the explosion threatened to incinerate her mind. She trracked it... allowed the energy to come and she had talked about it to the others many times.
"I am the Force, eternal and flowing, binding all existence." As the nova's fire reached for her, Matsu simply let go. She ceased to resist the energy and instead became the medium through which it moved. She became the space between the atoms, the invisible web of the Living Force. In the vision, the explosion didn't end in emptiness; the stardust began to swirl into nebulae, guided by an unseen current. Matsu's body hovered inches off the ground, her physical form becoming translucent as she transcended the blast. The fire faded, leaving her floating in a tranquil, shimmering cosmic tapestry. Her body felt rrenewed as light forrmed from her hands and Matsu could breathe for aa moment.
"I am Anti-Life, the Beast of Judgment. I am the dark at the end of everything. The end of universes, gods, worlds... of everything. And what will you be then, Master Matsu?" The chamber went pitch black a total absence of concept. Wutzek towered over her, a void-shaped titan whose voice was the sound of a billion dying screams. The visions vanished because there was no longer a universe to project them upon. This was Entropy. Matsu felt her memories slipping away, her name, her face, her very soul being erased by the Great Hunger. She felt small, cold, and utterly alone in a graveyard of galaxies. The demon leaned in, its breath the cold vacuum of the grave.
"I am hope. A single dream that endures in the deepest void. A seed from which new beginnings rise. I have walked the silence at the end of all things and chosen the light of creation." In the absolute nothingness, a small, soft glow appeared in the palm of Matsu's hand. It was fragile, yet it did not flicker. As she spoke, the pinprick of light stayed steady, a defiant "Yes" in the face of the end. Matsu's heart, which had almost stopped, gave a powerful, singular beat. The light from her hand began to bleed outward, not as a weapon, but as a foundation. She had seen it spark much much more... create farr more as the Hidden Path was built on it.
The force demon let out a horrific, discordant shriek as the light touched its "Anti-Life" essence. Hope was a poison to the Void; it was the one thing entropy could not calculate. Wutzek's shadowy form began to fracture, spider-webbing with cracks of brilliant, creative light. With a final, thunderous roar of disbelief, the demon shattered into a million harmless shadows that were instantly swallowed by the dawn of Matsu's dream. Matsu collapsed to her knees, gasping for air, her body bruised and shaking, but the chamber was warm, silent, and filled with the gentle, humming light of the Force. The force demon was snarling as Maatsu looked up from where she was. "Connel its time."
