Star Wars Roleplay: Chaos

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Peer Review (One Master)

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
@[member="Lord Depravious"] @[member="Tyrin Ardik"] @[member="Lord Ashmedai"] @[member="Arumi Zy"] @[member="Gabriel Volturi"] @[member="Helios Meldonus Kingpriest"] @[member="Darth Vazela"]

NOT Moridin or Kaine, thanks :p I love fighting y'all, but I wanna fight someone new.

Any Master can be the one, btw, regardless of faction. We're in the middle of nowhere, in the borders of the SE. Not hard to handwave a reason to be here.

AARGONAR​
BORDERS OF THE SITH EMPIRE​

A masked figure, its Force signature present but utterly unrecognizable, trudged across the desert. Aargonar's history bore its share of scars, culminating in a brutal Sith assault that Ashin had led from the front. Recent violence, however, was not the point. Aargonar had been aligned with Kaan, two thousand years ago, and then taken by Krayt a millennium later. The first assault on Aargonar had verified the existence of vaults inside an immense, eroded desert fortress. Vaults from Krayt's time, or older.

The Aargonar assault had not explored those vaults, and that had been deliberate, in the nature of Ashin leaving a cache for future contingencies. Perhaps the Empire had found them and cracked them open, outmaneuvering the memory wipes and other precautions Ashin had taken. Her focus, admittedly, had been elsewhere when she ordered the vault re-buried.

This was a risk. The risk was compounded by the need to maximize her senses, and that meant refraining from an absolute nullification of her Force signature. Anyone who claimed perfect stealth and perfect clarity of sense was an idiot, in her opinion. By the patterns of wind and dust, by the fear of small animals, by precognition, and by resonance or interference in the deep currents of the Force, Ashin stretched out to understand what lay around her in time and in space, as she walked the desert toward the abandoned fortress.

Her attention would get noticed; of that she had no doubt.
 
Among the sands, stood Lord Depravios. The wind swept the sand up, kissing his face with it. Slowly the sand became engrossed in the cracks of his armor, and in the furs upon his back and along his shoulders. The harsh winds battered his skin upon his face, drying it ever-so slowly; however, none of this bothered the dark being that sat upon the dune sea waiting.. It was as if he was waiting for something, something large. A presence that to him was quite large, he had not a clue who it was, but perhaps this person could give him a challenge that he so desperately longed for in this universe. He had heard of the assault on Aargonar, having not been subjected to the memory wipe at the time of Ashin Varanin, he was relatively coherent on the events that transpired that day. An interesting even, to say the least about it. Lord Depravious, however, cared not for the minute details of why the woman would come looking for it again, nor did he care about the vault itself, he came for the one thing that he always sought, and would seek to his grave.. Death.

He was after all one of the darkest beings to walk the galaxy, back then and now. He had held all of that rage, all of that sadness for so long, he cared not for the lifeforms that knew he was there. His eyes glistened with the rage of his ancestors as he raised his hands high into the air. He released presence through the force, causing a massive disturbance to all of those in the area. The very air around him shook as he released his full power, as a symbolic action to let Ashin Varanin know just who awaited her. The bogan side of the force swelled around Lord Depravious, as if the force could physically manifest it self through the aura of the Darksides favorite son, it would have been Lord Depravious. The very sand around his feet arose into tentacle like shapes from the manifestation of the force, as he slowly arched his elbows outwards, and his hands inwards as if beckoning something to come to him.

Perhaps unlike some other members of the Sith Empire, Lord Depravious had respect for Ashin though. He did believe Voracitos to be a true Sith, nor did he believe this new Emperor to have proven himself worthy of the mantle. However, that was much different with Ashin, he had respected her. He had trusted her to lead the Sith Empire in a way that would ultimately lead to its Resurrection as the greatest power in the galaxy. When he left for a journey to Eisalai to engage his former brother in combat he understood that should he not return, Ashin was very capable of turning worlds into complete ice without him. And yet, she had failed and the mantle fell to Darth Voracitos, a shadow of what it took to be a Sith. This ultimately disappointed Lord Depravious when upon his return he learned of Ashin's disappearance from the Sith Empire, and that she had now turned up as a Dark Jedi, in this new.. Lords of the Fringe faction..

The man was, however, not phased by this move. It was quite clear cut to Lord Depravious according to his lore, of which he followed strictly. Betrayal in the Sith was exilement and death, nothing more. Those who betrayed their fellow brothers and sisters were to be laughed at, scorned and shunned by the order. They were also to Lord Depravious nothing more then meat at this time. Should that be Ashin headed his way, he would no doubt strike her down for her betrayal against the Empire. The same would be held accountable for the man labeled Tirdarius whom he had also heard fell to the Lords of the Fringe. A true betrayal of the Sith.. How could one so easily betray their brothers and sisters? Those that respected and loved them, that looked up to them, and now that fought against them. Lord Depravious would have nothing of it, betrayal was the worst form of dishonor, something that he spat upon.
 

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
Depravious hadn't bothered to disguise the identity of his Force presence, with Force techniques or with any equivalent to the alchemical lacquer that decorated Ashin's light armor. It left her signature unrecognizable, and the mask did the rest.

Not that the face underneath was Ashin Varanin's face.

Oh, there was always the possibility that the highest levels of the Empire now knew that Grand Admiral Shira Karrde of the Fringe Confederation was Ashin Cardé Varanin, presumed dead after Moridin's assault on the Vagrant Fleet at Void Station. The Chancellor of the Republic knew that, and Mand'alor Verz Horak, and a handful of others. The secret would get out in time. All secrets die -- she knew this better than most, after being hunted across the stars by the Dark Council that had once served her. Rather than wreck an empire that she had built, she had gone elsewhere, started from scratch, and conquered the deadliest terrors of the Unknown Regions -- in a location that offered many, many advantages.

Accomplishing more by herself than the entire Empire since her departure. The Empire's momentum had died the day they cast her out. Any glance at a map would reveal that Roche had ended the Empire and planted seeds in fertile ground, far, far away.

No, she had no cause for apology or shame. Such egotistical thoughts stretched a grin across the Dark Master's face, beneath her mask, as she ascended the slope of a sand dune and caught sight of the being she'd sensed. He stood among waving tentacles of sand, arms bent as if beckoning in welcome. Depravious. He'd come from nowhere, burned bright and quick, then vanished, off to his own devices. But he'd helped her take this world, personally subjugating a city half a continent from here while she tackled a mountain fortress with her First Apprentice. The dune's crest dimpled under her boot, and she paused, knowing she was silhouetted against a dusty sky. From here, at the top of the dune, she could see the distant fortress, the occasional divots of sarlacci, the beginnings of a sandstorm. Aargonar could match any world of the Empire for hostility. A good planet for an aescetic.

Not that Depravious was meditating out here for his spiritual health. Aesceticism had skipped two hundred generations of the Sith, according to the sources she could find. The last true aescetic, one who prized isolation, self-deprivation, and self-discipline, had been Calypho -- now that was a fascinating holocron. She'd learned as much about self-discipline from Calypho as she'd learned about self-sacrifice from Lumiya. But those sources and principles were fringe interests among Sith; she held no illusions about the public palatability of her preferred interpretation of the Sith code. No, if a Sith was out here in the waste, that Sith was not here for meditation, but to intercept her.

Sometimes she knew hubris would kill her. Other times she knew that only hubris could explain how the universe warped to fit her.

She stepped down the sand dune toward Depravious, and a burnt-orange lightsabre blade flared to life, bright as a dying sun and vastly different from the sky-blue weapon she'd carried as Empress. The blade's tip brushed the dune, and droplets of molten glass rolled down the slope. She raised it in the sort of loose guard that worked best with mobility on shifting ground, committing to nothing except visible purpose.

"This land is mine, in every way that matters," she said, in a voice that did not belong to Ashin Varanin. The mask distorted it a little, too. The form of the challenge didn't matter. What mattered was visible intent: To kill.
 
A mere smile came across Lord Depravious's face as the presumed woman spoke to him. He had one mission, and that was to stop anyone from reaching their destination here.. She was able to mask her feel in the force, but definitely not her presence. Lord Depravious knew that whoever this person was that sat in front of him was quite strong in the force, which means this was just who he was here for.. It was easy to pick that much up, and he attempted to see just who she was through that mask, but it would matter not inevitably. They would die, and Lord Depravious would live, it was as simple as that to him. There was no such thing as pride that lay within Lord Depravious's bones, only certainty. She had drew first blood metaphorically by bringing out her weapon, a symbolic act of aggression, something that Lord Depravious thrived from.

He however, did not bring out his own blade immediately, instead he slowly closed his eyes.. The force allowing him to ascend slowly into the air as he slowly lowered his arms to be perpendicular from his neck, his palms facing upwards to the sky. The armor that was nestled around his arms shone in the light as the chrome from them reflected the sun. He looked inwards upon himself in that brief moment, allowing the sun that kissed his skin to bring that warm feeling coursing back into his veins as the ebb of the force literally shook around his body. He was indeed truly sorry for what happened to the former Empress, had he been there he would have died by her-side yet, when his brother had returned to challenge him for the final time, lightning struck the ground and battle erupted that day, a battle that lasted until one was dead. And, as he slowly looked inwards upon himself he began to see parts of his past. This time, it was the treasure world of the old Sith Empire. His former leaders world, a world that he had taken control of, in order to show his fellow brothers and sisters of Lord Shadows madness.. Instead of allowing Lord Depravious to keep the world, and keep Lord Shadow's wife, Shadow obliterated the world in search of her. He could not stand the thought of Depravious having his wife, and so he sacrificed thousands of the once vibrant empire to take back a single person. They each came, and blood coated the walls as they fell before Lord Depravious.. He took everything we loved and turned it to dust.. The voice reverberated in his head.

Once Depravious opened his eyes, the sand around his aura dissipated, the heat of the rage welled up inside of his aura literally disintegrating it. As tears streamed down his face he screamed, "Let's goo!" A sound that reverberated through the area, all the way up to the citadel behind him and with his mouth open wide the tears still streaming down, he clapped his hands in front of his body. Upon the clap the previous tendrils that were formed out of sand turned into darksided tendrils, now shooting out in a flash towards Ashin, the rage and sadness boiling over in them manifesting the bogan side of the force through their very core.. The game was on..
 

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
Let's.

"HAAAAUUUUUUUUM."

A Force Bellow exploded out from her, a hemispherical shockwave made of will imposed on reality. On all levels of reality. He was manifestly the sort to bring up and amplify his own emotions, nearly to the point of losing control. A valid strategy, but Ashin had always preferred to nurture a cold, sharp hate, harnessed with absolute control. A slower burn, to be sure, but this kind of Dark Side use was about the will to dominate, and ten thousand worlds could attest to hers. The deadly tendrils recoiled, ripped up from the ground -- ground that ceased to exist in any symbolic or practical way. Because that immense shockwave tore into the sand, churned it up, carried through the roots of the dunes. The desert evaporated beneath his feet, blown away to a depth of perhaps a metre. The shockwave continued to propagate, lessening proportional to the square of distance travelled. Out behind Depravious, hundreds of metres away, a sarlacc writhed in discomfort. Ashin took its pain as power and lumbered forward across the disturbed sand. Echoes of an old limp slowed her a little; the damage to her right knee had been carried through and repeated with this, her new body.

Her Former Majesty was, however, a tank. Slow she might be at the moment, lightsabre raised for the assault, but she could outlast more than most. If Depravious had any guesses about her true identity, now might be when he might start testing her resilience and endurance. What better way to gain insight about an enemy than by attacking in a measured way?

She reached the range just outside extreme sabre distance, and kept coming, feet thudding on the sand. Now came a test, because frankly she didn't remember enough about Depravious to know whether he would keep his distance and keep throwing energy around, or whether he would engage her blade-to-blade. She suspected the former: Depravious clearly had no problem with wasting energy. A man after Moridin's own heart, she thought wryly, lightsabre raised as she advanced. But she and Moridin had fought twice, toe to toe, equals. She'd faced Reyven Samoth and Darron Wraith and Darth Voracitos and Velok and Sirella -- all masters of the big cinematic effects, extreme use of energy, expenditures that didn't lend themselves well to the long game. For her part, even the Bellow necessary to throw back the tendrils of darkness was more of an expenditure of energy than made her comfortable.

Still, even energy was will, at these levels.
 
Lord Depravious's cold visage watched as his tendrils were ripped apart by the bellow. A move that he had worked quite some time on perfecting, shredded into pieces in a matter of moments..This will be it. He thought to himself as the woman began to advance. The sand that had now all but gone from under his feet had no effect upon him as he slightly descended down to the ground.. His eyes slowly began to return to their former shade of white, while the center of his eyes became their original fiery red color once more. She unfortunately had him wrong in the using boundless rage department. As it would seem, he probably did use an excess amount of energy and rage in order to attack, not because he enjoyed it or because it was how he worked.. Oh no, the rage that Lord Depravious had built up within him far exceeded that of his own individual rage. An entire civilizations peace, happiness, sadness, despair, rage, hatred, love, compassion, and death loomed within Lord Depravious's aura and emotions. Unfortunately for her, that may come as a surprise, that what he had just unleashed was a fraction of the rage that built up within him day by day.

He analysed each and every move that she made, and even though he had done his research on Ashin extensively he still did not recognize her. He recognized her movements as familiar, and her presence in the force as moderately familiar, but not enough to put his finger on it. Perhaps further in the battle things would be reveal to him more, but for now there were much more pressing matters on his mind. Whether it was Ashin or not, he must fight her as if she was more powerful than even Ashin Varanin, it was then and only then that he could assure victory for himself.

With his axe upon his back he thought for a moment.. This opponent had shown her worth in the repelling of his tendrils, and although his power in the force was very much impressive to most, even those highly trained in the arts of the force he was not a fan of exertion either. He thrived in close quarters combat, it is where he ripped Darth Axurions arms off and beat him to death with said arms. It's where he had slain several of the Siodmaks, and several of the pitiful Kensei that attempted to garner the already tainted name of Kamari. Lord Depravious understood that the person across from him, if coming at him in such a fashion, was obviously much more comfortable with close quarters combat. A notion that made the man genuinely smile, this battle would be one to remember for ages hopefully.

The Axe, although his weapon of choice, was not needed in this moment. He was more than comfortable fighting any opponent with his sword forged in the flames of Eisalai. The home of his ancestors, the place where his love was ultimately destroyed.. Not only true lover, but his people, his culture, his heart. The meaning behind this blade is what gave him strength using it, the Sith Sword itself held it's own power in fighting, yet it was the sentimental meaning behind the blade that gave it strength in battle to Depravious. It a mere sword was fine with Depravious; however, this was no mere sword it saw the rise and the fall of his people, it watched as people were cut down left and right, as priestess' were cut down. As the last priestess, his lover, was cut down and the line of Kamari and the Elder Sith Empire destroyed.

And now, as this woman walked at him he immediately unsheathed his sword, as it was drawn the leather holster that held it slowly scraped along the metal of the blade. The blade glistened in the light above them that was now slightly blocked by the cloud of dust that had obviously been knocked up by none other than Ashin herself.

His face pale, yet his eyes like razors glared upwards towards Ashin as he brought his blade out to the side. The ground below his feet felt so soft now that the majority of the sand had gone from it, and with such he slid his foot along the surface positioning it just right, to begin an engagement in combat. He used the force to allow his body to flip upwards in the air, his blade out to the side in an eloquent fashion no coming directly for Ashin Varanin. If he could not see the truth from her exterior, or her presence in the force as good as his sensory levels were, he would find the truth in her blade.
 

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
A long side cut like that, coupled with a jump to negate the soft slope between them, just begged and begged for a specific response. She slid her right boot forward and down, the side of her heel biting deeper into the sand. Her lightsabre whipped around, and she clenched it in both hands for a low, nearly vertical block. The Sith blade slammed into her lightsabre near the emitter, with enough force to drive her sideways against her wide stance, but she was still moving forward with her sliding foot, using the unstable terrain to her advantage. That deepened her stance a little, dropped her shoulder-

And met the velocity and impetus of Depravious' charge with an armored shoulder check to the sternum. Moving as quickly as he was, through the air, he likely wouldn't have the luxury of altering course through contact with the ground or through time-consuming telekinesis. It wasn't that he'd overshot his landing, either; she'd just used the motion of her block to move forward and meet him just as he touched down, while he still had all manner of momentum unchecked.

The shoulder check was also, as it happened, a focal point for a Force blast, as with any gesture and telekinesis. Ashin preferred her blasts of that nature to focus on a shoulder check, an elbow strike, or a stomp. She had no desire to ragdoll her enemies; the close game was her friend. No, this particular blast, honed to something like perfection, was directed downward, with the shoulder strike to the sternum as the focal point. When she'd pulled this against Arumi Zy in her old throne room on Dromund Kaas, the point had been to slam him against the marble floor and weigh him down. Here, on gently slanted sand, where she had the high ground but only by a little, the impact might drive a normal mortal waist-deep into the sand with a broken spine or send him sprawling, tumbling, fouled.

Against Depravious, the shoulder-strike-slash-downward-blast could be nothing more than a delaying tactic. Which was why her left hand remained on the sabre, warding away the blade that had made contact with hers less than a heartbeat before. And why her right hand snapped up, simple tricep extension with a wrench in her back, in an attempt to grab him by the face and Force Drain him right through her armored gauntlet.
 
Ahh, so much happening in such a brief moment of time. Lord Depravious was definitely not ready for the shoulder-check to the sternum, nor was he ready for the force blast that was about to come off of it. But, improvisation is what made things like this so interesting to Lord Depravious, it's what forces you to be a great warrior, it's what forces you to choose between honor and malice, or even both.. By the end of the Day Ashin Varanin would know the true meaning of hopeless. What it meant to have that sun that shone so brightly inside of her, that drove her to complete her tasks, burn out.. Even the brightest star in the galaxy eventually burns out..

Her strategy was obvious to Lord Depravious, keeping the higher ground.. How simple, yet it was almost brutish of her to attempt this tactic against a Lord of his power, he understood that she did not know exactly what his power was like no matter who it was; however, there is an eloquence to fighting that she seemed to wish to just brute through, how fun. As soon as she shoulder checked him, Lord Depravious brought his hand down to her shoulder, in a manifestation of the force he began to absorb the Force Blast enough to mitigate any damage coming off of it, where he landed softly on his feet in the sand a slight bit away from her.

Lord Depravious quickly fell into the stance of Atra-Manua , a stance that his ancestors had taught to him, a stance that took the hope away from his victims in the matter of moments, and then slowly and surely draining them of that light they so desperately wished to hang on to for so long.. He slammed his blade into the sand, only sinking it in a few inches however, this allowing him to react with his blade quickly in order to parry. With his blade going into the ground he dropped onto his right knee, his left knee driving into his chest as he dropped his head downwards. As he did so he cape slowly fluttered in the wind down to the ground from the speed in which he took place in this stance.

A stance symbolic of the darkness that once walked the galaxy and would now walk the galaxy again, laid before Ashin Varanin.. Something that Lord Depravious had trained in for ages, perfected it on almost absolutely every level, and as soon as she reached her hand out she would pay for that.. Due to his duck, her hand would most likely come above his head, where he brought his sword around from the ground in a flourishing spin at the center of her arm between her wrist and elbow. A strike that to almost anyone would sever the arm completely.. And with that eloquence he flicked his wrist on his free right arm, manifesting the force around her body, in a force stasis at that very moment. A tactic used by so many, yet it was effective, stop their movement cut off a limb.

Atra Manua wasn't about using simple tactics though, it was exactly as the aforementioned paragraph describes it was a form that represented the darkness of the galaxy, that left you cold. It's main purpose was to cut limb-by-limb from ones opponent in order to leave them hopeless an desperate, before you walked away..
 

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
This was not the first time that Ashin had run up against the hope that contact could be significant. Granted, often before it had been a more symbolic measure, a matter of personality. Likewise, Ashin had often faced the hope that coldness and darkness could drain her away. As the incarnation of cold, she found this...more than a little amusing, and had ever since Reyven Samoth first tried it on her. All temperature exchange was a matter of relative gradients, and Depravious' reliance on Atra Manua implied a hope - that word again - that his cold lay closer to absolute zero than hers.

Debatable.

Her Force drain, already keyed to wipe the life from a Sith Master, latched onto the Force stasis and ripped away its foundations, but she had no intention of moving an inch from where she stood in this moment, lightsabre useless down by her left hip, right arm outstretched above his head. The tradeoffs she had made had fortified her at the expense of other skills, and as his blade sheared into her gauntlet she poured the Force into the sorts of constructs and thought patterns that enhanced durability for flesh and metal, in the same manner as a Krevaaki Jedi Master using his walking stick to hold off Exar Kun.

Depravious' strike hit with the force of a turbolaser blast. Her arm didn't move an inch, and she confessed herself satisfied. And now, and only now, did she move in response, her initial burst of Force Drain having wiped the stasis from existence.

The man now kneeling beneath her outstretched and quite intact hand had presented the crown of his head for her to grab with bruising force, and had also manage to present his face. Her deep stance became a spring forward, a simple, very short line of trajectory from her armored knee to his lowered face.

Art had betrayed him, left him open to practicality. And simple practicality was the hallmark of the most ancient and durable style of blade combat among Force-users -- the form of which Ashin Varanin was the galaxy's unquestioned master. If he wanted proof that she was Varanin, he'd find it written on her kneecap and signed with the heavy left-handed chop that rained down at his undefended right shoulder a moment later. She was reminded of a time when Avicus DuSang had tried to get low for an artsy blade strike, and the non-Forcer Sarge Potteiger had simply planted his boot in the Dark Lord's face. That holocam recording still gave her a glow. Not that she'd ever tell Sarge.
 
Absolute Zero was what would incur upon Ashin Varanin, there would be nothing but cold left in her veins. The same thing that would happen should you remove the core from a planet, absolute ice. A notion that wasn't too far from the imagination of Lord Depravious, a notion that would soon be incurred upon the woman standing in front of him no matter the petty tricks she wished to use to enhance her combat skills. She had lost before, she would lose again, this time was absolutely no different. Lord Depravious would most definitely not go down without taking her with him.

Ahh, the muse of the force how it served her so. She was obviously an experienced master to be able to use such a move against a Sith Sword, imbued with the emotions of the past this weapon was the bane of most force users; however, she proved to be interesting to say the least. However, she thought that art was the meaning of this stance, what a laugh.. Her misconceptions would be her end in this fight, this move was made for one simple task, killing slowly. What she saw as openings, Depravious saw as easy counters. Counters easily made against a once great, but now fallen, Empress.

As her hand came down to his head and or neck area, and her knee up to his face he quickly smiled. He used the leg that he had positioned on his chest to quickly vault to the right side, her left side. In the roll his blade slid off of her skin where the hilt retracted quickly to his side where it gave his left arm more strength behind the obviously soon to be incoming hit.

As he landed down back in the same stance, his arm jolted outwards in a stabbing motion to the top of her leg, exactly where the hip conjoined with the leg. A truly crippling hilt should it actually land, shredding her flesh from the muscle and bone. Although, Lord Depravious knew exactly what would possibly happen; however, he knew that a mastery of the durability of the flesh against a sith sword of such stature all over her body would certainly be extremely taxing upon her body, her mind and her emotions, sure she would be able to block the incoming attack, but that was not Lord Depravious's ploy.. His ploy was much darker, something that she could possibly not comprehend.

As the Blade flashed towards her leg with the speed of his arm increased by the force rage that coursed through his veins and his muscles, his free hand swayed out to the side manifesting the force. It slowly began to swirl the force within his hand, manifesting it and facilitating the force to flow all the way down his arm, coursing through his already force enhanced muscles a red sphere began to swirl around in his hand. Yet, within Lord Depravious an anger began to swirl, something that did not reflect his own individual anger, yet something deeper something darker, something more hateful.

All of those who stand against the lore die. Lord Depravious thought to himself as his blade extended outwards at Ashin Varanin's leg in a direct stab. Practicality was not sacrificed for Art, rather Art added to Practicality.
 

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
Regardless, Practicality was still about to smash Art in the figurative face. Depravious was, after all, stabbing on a vector that was pretty much exactly where her lightsabre was going, and it took barely any redirection to turn that left-handed slash into a hammerblow that slammed his blade down and away. Effort required: Pretty much zero. For a Shii-Cho duellist, absolutely textbook.

And while Lord Depravious gathered strength for what would doubtless be another immense expenditure of energy, she went for something much simpler than he could possibly comprehend. Simpler, and faster. No energy manipulator alive could keep gathering a blast like that at close range while getting interrupted with due disregard for Art. There were distinct benefits to focusing on the Core Powers and idealizing directness. Benefits also accrued when one's telekinetic training and experience focused not on detail work but on brute force. A very fast but bone-shattering Force push ripped out from her free right hand.

And that was all she needed to do to derail, defuse and disrupt fething everything. One simple block, one fast Force push. One didn't stand there gathering energy while at point-blank range. One did that kind of thing at longer range, and preferably with cover. No combatant alive would give you a polite moment to sit there and power up. The other benefit of a fast, simple response was that it left her better able to focus on what, exactly, he was cooking up. Her blast was keyed to interrupt it (ideally by shattering Depravious' bones point-blank and sending him flying across the dunes to wind up in a helpfully placed sarlacc), but that didn't mean diffuse energy or a half-broken curse couldn't give her some grief after the fact. Using just a Force push let her prepare for whatever proportion of his attack actually managed to manifest, assuming her strike didn't throw it wide at the same time as it forced him to divert his focus. Wasn't like he could pull another jaunty sidestep in the sand, either. Point blank was point blank, this shockwave was wide, and whatever get-out-of-the-way-itude he'd stored up was currently being spent on the (soon-to-be-broken) focus necessary to store up that kind of power.

No, I'm wrong. Ideal isn't broken bones and a sarlacc. Ideal is that energy ball detonating and taking his hand off.
 
How practicality would be her downfall, but for now there were much more pressing matters at hand. The Force Shockwave coming at him was one of power, she was definitely more of an up close dominator; however, she seemed to also be quite trained in the core force powers at the very least.. And in the moment that she extended her hand out before manifesting the force through her arm into the powerful shockwave that was to come, Lord Depravious brought his chin up, an action to quickly bring a force shield around himself trying to mitigate the damage of the incoming attack..

Thankfully for the force shield it mitigated the bone-crushing damage that was sure to have been inflicted upon his body; however, the sheer power of it was sure to send him flying backwards into the sand, where he landed plumply on the ground, before sighing for a moment. She had deserved more then the sword, congratulations to Ashin Varanin for besting him with his sword in combat but he was not done with her yet..

The Red Ball that glowed in his hand had been absorbed back into his arm whilst he looked outwards towards her. His glare sharpening towards her as he stood up from the ground, his cape now cloaked in the sand that was around his body. It slowly drizzled off of his cape before he brought his hand upwards to his neck and un clipped the cape from around his body providing him more movement and more versatility. After throwing his cape over to the side he brought his sword back into it's sheath, his body now symbolically calming down with the sheathing of the sword.

As his body calmed he slowly closed his eyes, the force swelling in his body. He had been trying so many taxing moves against her all to be shut down, perhaps one that was a slight bit more sly.. Something that required a slight bit of energy and will, and something that would also catch her off guard that she couldn't see coming until it was possible too late.. She'll never see it coming.. Thought the man, no standing with his hands down to his sides, and his eyes closed for only a brief moment in time.

As he opened his eyes again, their fiery red taint came back, a rage was obviously present in his body language; however, it was being suppressed or rather re-directed in some form. The Blood Shot eyes began to slowly burn her way in a form of Deadly Sight. The same move the Dark Jedi Sariss had used against Kyle Katarn in the New Republic era. To any mere mortal, this move would have immediately disintegrated their body, perhaps even to Ashin Varanin it would disintegrate part of her body before she was able to defend it; however, the main purpose of the move was to weaken her greatly in the means of massive burns down to even her muscles, something that would weaken even the strongest of fighters.
 

Ashin Varanin

Professional Enabler
If the galaxy had one unquestioned Master of Deadly Sight, it was the Dark Master Jacen Cavill -- and Ashin had been the one to grant him his Darth name at the end of a long training. The power Depravious employed was familiar to her. It took her back to her own training under a master of energy manipulation, to days spent walking through fire and catching lightsabres alongside a man who had once survived a point-blank nuclear blast. She could never attain such heights of grandeur.

But she didn't need to.

Her armor, simple durasteel, began to heat viciously against her skin, but she was used to that -- the alchemical armor known as Contempt, nearly indestructible but conducive to heat, had translated most energy attacks into simple heat for many, many years. She no longer had Contempt, of course, but the experience remained relevant as his Deadly Sight turned her armor to slag. She resisted the heat with ease. The armor flew from her in all directions, half-melted body glove ripping away, leaving her stripped down to an athletic bra and a pair of functional shorts over hard-edged muscle and more than a few scars. The clawmarks of a Ssi-Ruuvi blackscale decorated her face, the acidic blood of a monster had marred her breastbone, other scars adorned her and she boasted a handful of tattoos. Her face was not that of Ashin Varanin, nor was her body -- not that Depravious, or anyone in the Empire apart from Spencer, had ever been that familiar with her body.

His Deadly Sight continued to rebound from her, and she continued to resist with expert tutaminis. Her body protection was much like the power that allowed a simple walking stick to deflect a lightsabre. If he wanted to try and outlast her, she was fine with that. Except for the part where she lunged across the desert toward him, heat radiating from her, seeking close range again despite her lack of armor. After all, the true test of a tank was not whether she could turn excellent armor to her advantage, but whether she could still stand firm without it. Those scars suggested the affirmative. The Force gathered around her further, in a dense zone of denial, as she sprinted at him across the sand. Her sabre found a balanced, two-handed guard, a clear telegraphing that she intended to face that sword and that axe at close range. Behind him, oh, a hundred metres away or so, was that sarlacc. A long-term plan, perhaps. In the meantime, she angled her charge to the left, chopping hard across his gut -- too high to jump above, too low to duck beneath.
 

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