Private Purgation

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: The Ablution, en-route to Abeloth's Planet

Her time aboard the Ablution had made her miss the grey hull of her own vessel. Almost worth reaching out to find the missing thing, but putting it off as a matter of due time. Her hands figdetted with the hem of her clothing, finding some release from the anxiety of their trip as she watched the vortex around them ferry them to their destination.

She'd become used to those that remained by Onrai's side. A side effect perhaps of her ponderous upbringing as a space faring child of permanent indentured labor. The strange and obscure beings that made up the far flung reaches of the galaxy a sight most would not be beholden to even in their dreams.

Save for perhaps their nightmares.

Her body ached from the training that seemed to never end. Time stretched back and forth it seemed to her mind. Both flying by and dragging on for what she could only express as an eternity. Her ability to produce a markedly decent barrier finally absolving her of one worry only to come across a surprise in the process.

The first crackle of lightning splintering off the orb that protected her perhaps not surprising for her mentor was something of an alarm for the one previously believing themselves incapable of wielding the force. It had thrown her from her focus enough that the training saber had almost struck her right side.

An overcompensation she had found for her lack of vision on the left half of her body. Correcting her actions so vastly that she became almost blind to slow or overly swift strikes with what might have been her strong side.

The second surprise being the subconscious willing of the force to protect her hand as it extended to take hold of the saber meant for her flank. Grabbing hold of the raw energy had blanked her mind and drawn the effort from her limbs. Catching her so thoroughly off guard she sat squarely down in place.

The shock had been short lived when the hand of her mentor descended with a pleased pat atop her crown of dark hair.

Now clean and sufficiently fed, or at least enough to take the edge off of what was lingering from the week. A hunger that existed with the last bit of training she had been performing of late. Having only been allowed to consume nutrition to her hearts content while in the company of the Agents, the training of sustaining herself upon the force had been far easier for her than what was likely expected of others.

A food pellet stretched for two or three days between lack of sleep and surprises was beginning to become so common that even the pangs of hunger were lessening to what she could assume to be a margin of success. No where near the magnitude of her mentors ability, but for a mortal like herself, perhaps something of an astonishment.

Her connection with the force becoming more and more solid, but still feeling that small tether that made her worry. Like a valve or switch that had yet to be removed. A lingering doubt in her mind kept neatly tucked to the farthest corners of the worries of her mind. Overshadowed by the ones currently riding the surface layer of her mind as they drew closer to their destination.

Merely a breaths length of time for her mentor. Perhaps even less than that but being unable to fathom what significant measure she could draw for such a thing.

The thought of where Onrai had traveled and time she had spent perusing the galaxy at her own leisure something of a mystical train of thinking that often ferried her to sleep. Something she might have the privilege of partaking of when all was said and done. But a worry for another time. Faces came and went, bonds formed and broke for mortals, and the same could likely be said for the being that oversaw her training.

"What will I see in my own time." She spoke quietly to no one and everyone in the same breath. A question posed to the void of the galaxy with no expectations of being answered.

 

[Onrai]

if Onrai had been a mortal as she was once upon a time, it would have felt like an eternity that had been spent guiding Sasmay along the path of becoming a skilled Force-user. Never in her time as a Sith, as a vagabond, or as an exile had she dedicated the time and effort towards teaching, training, and empowering an apprentice like the former cast-away experiment of the fallen Sith Emperor.

The months spent in arduous efforts to strengthen Sasmay had awakened feelings that Onrai had long abandoned - care. A protective urge. The instinct of fraternal love. All had been shed in her vanity decades prior, naught but embers smoldering in the gullet of her now-monstrous being that had found a way through Sasmay to be rekindled.

Is this what it means to care for someone?

As the Ablution came into orbit of a world whose depths of starlight were warped by the gravitational pull of distant and not-so-distant black holes, the spectral form of Onrai soon manifested forth from the shadows of Sasmay's dedicated quarters - she had been given a large room made from one or two of the abandoned officer quarters.

"We're almost here." She said. "Are you ready for the next part of your training?"

What would happen here would change Sasmay forever.

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: The Ablution, en-route to Abeloth's Planet

Her eyes didn't drift as Onrai made herself known, instead taking in the new sights for a brief moment more.

"As one could be." She spoke, humor in her tone.

Much has passed by outside the scope of her understanding. Only becoming more aware of the possibilities the galaxy held the longer she shared time with her mentor. Something she would likely miss upon the completion of her mentors task.

"I don't know that I'd ever be ready without your hand guiding me." The words flower easily. An expression of trust that had been growing since she'd been pulled from the deck of her ship some time ago.

Most wouldn't have been so easily swayed perhaps. But nothing had been done besides the interest in seeing an apprentice grow into their own. And Sasmay wasn't one to return such kindness with suspicions. At least not yet.

She turned finally with a warm smile to the form.

 

[Onrai]

"I knew there was a reason I liked you."

The spectre manifested its rarer humanoid appearance - fair skin, blonde hair, a set of simple robes the appropriate means to exist within the population of the galaxy unknown and untouched. She said nothing for the time being but came over and brought a hand to the top of Sasmay's head, a gesture of her appreciation for her apprentice that was the most expressive way she showcased it.

"You've taken to everything I've taught you with a great degree of skill. Your dedication to it is exceptional and impressive to say the least. You have become everything to me that he did not believe you could be." She of course alluded to the persistently pending interest of the former Sith Emperor who had at one time made demands of her return to him. She looked out the window of Sasmay's quarters, down on the sparse world that had once been the domain of the last known Celestials to inhabit the galaxy - the last Celestials, and their monstrous creation that had nearly damned the galaxy to destruction. How fortunate it was that she sought to establish a new order of such beings, ones who would not make the same mistakes as their predecessors.

The Ablution finally ceased its travels into the orbit of Abeloth's Planet, a soft shudder of the vessel indicating the battleship's settling into a secure position over the world. Onrai smiled as she looked over at Sasmay.

"Shall we take the shuttle, or would you prefer the quicker route down there?"

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: The Ablution, en-route to Abeloth's Planet

She enjoyed the small display that her mentor shared. The initial feeling having shifted some time ago from mild annoyance to appreciation upon realizing it was more than a way to fluster her.

"Part my skill, but mostly having an excellent teacher. " She replied, her eyes drifting to the planet as the vessel settled with a soft lurch. The question was met with a moment of pause to consider the options presented.

A brief internal debate had her steeling herself for the what was to come next.

"Quicker way." The nervous trill in her voice plain as the stars beyond the window.

 

[Onrai]

"I'm hardly an excellent teacher. You should have seen my track record as a mortal." She jested, reminded of the numerous failures that had abandoned her, or died, or simply vanished as though they had never existed before. Sasmay was truly the most successful of her students throughout the entirety of her life. "But thank you, Sas. It means a lot to hear that from you."

She paused for a moment, letting Sasmay make the decision regarding how she wanted to head down to the planet below. When she responded in the affirmative regarding how she wanted to travel down, Onrai's form once more melted back into ethereal shadow before consuming her apprentice, the shade collapsing in upon itself and leaving Sasmay in complete darkness.

When the darkness receded, Sasmay found herself on a planet with naught much more than a variety of different ruins. It was but a small settlement, a few ruined homes and structures with naught much else. There was a ripple in the air within the ruins that suggested a hint of something more being on the world, but otherwise nothing seemed to truly suggest that the world was any different from one where a primitive civilization had gestated and eventually died.

"There are three reasons we are here." She said. "Firstly... tell me. What do you know of the Celestials, the Ones, and of Abeloth herself?" She asked.

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

"Never too lato to learn from the past. And you're welcome. " She offered.

Having prepared herself, and remembered only some of the last time she had traveled in such a way with her mentor, she didn't become alarmed at the sudden darkness that surrounded her. When the darkness faded, she spied the area with a curious eye. Taking in the details of their surroundings before Vanessa spoke again.

Her brow furrowed at the question, gave becoming distant trying to remember anything she had heard or found of such things.

"The Celestials were powerful beings, and if I remember they were also called the design-no. Architect? Architects. And believed, no. The ones to have constructed large, um. Stations and such. The Ones, came...before the celestials. No. After, maybe." She was honest with her words, frowning at how she second guessed herself.

"Abeloth I think fought, uh. One or the other. Or something. I don't remember who won, exactly. Well. I mean. The Ones, won, cause Abeloth was supposedly a galactic threat or something is how someone explained it. But it all sounded like here-say or a legend." One of the unknown planets her ship had stopped at hosted a species that seemed to spin yarn with a firm belief in what they spoke. Some sounded like something off the holonet, other bits like spacer rumors.

But the old being that had spoken with the crew was absolute in their words.

 

[Onrai]

"Were, are. It makes no difference now." Onrai said as the duo traveled towards the ruined houses. They were geometrically cut out of blocks of stone, perfectly locked together as though they had been laser-etched, though many of the stones were cracked or crumbled and none of the buildings had intact roofs.

"The Celestials were at one time benevolent overseers over the galaxy. Then the Old Ones came, their own creations, and with their touch defiled the purity and innocence of the galaxy. The Old Ones themselves spawned further pestilences - the shattered Typhojem, whose heart still beats in the breast of another. The crystalline Ooradryl whose shattered and splintered corpse still rots, weeping its fluids from between cracked crystalline scales in the voids of Dark Illathurion. Tharagorrogaraht, the Night Spirit, whose essence was subjugated by one Ingrid L'lerim and whose shadowed power will feed her forevermore. And lastly, the most insidious and monstrous of them all: the vile Mnggal-Mnggal, amorphous all-consumer and self-proclaimed 'God of rot.' The war between the Old Ones and the Celestials drove them back into their world between worlds, the sanctum from which their originated in and where they wait to this day as the galaxy runs amok."

The two stepped further forward towards the ripple in space-time, and Onrai's hand reached out to tug at its edges as though it were made of fabric. The ripple opened, a swirl of light revealing most plainly an enrapturing pathway to another land. "When the Ones, those three Celestials who had chosen to incarnate themselves within physical form and oversee the galaxy their fellows had abandoned, abandoned this world to Abeloth, their unwitting creation empowered with the same godhood as they yet shackled by a mortal mind whose excesses were amplified in her ascension... They utilized a gateway, an interdimensional transit line to travel to the realm the Jedi and Sith know of today as Mortis. With their deaths, the galaxy was free to function independently - and we have seen the many wondrous decisions its occupants have made." She said with such harsh sarcasm.

"When I slayed Ooradryl and his spawn, consumed their power, I became as they once were: a demigoddess of a fashion. The universe requires guidance and protection from the Father of Shadows, from the wayward creep of Mnggal-Mnggal, and from the countless forgotten untold horrors across the galaxy waiting to once more arise." She said, before looking up in the sky. "And of the horrors yet to be gestated, as you and I well know of." The allusion to Kaine Zambrano and the threat he could pose to the galaxy in the years to come was strong as ever.

"We are here because I wish to give you that which very few have been offered and none have received: the opportunity to become as I am, to be a part of something greater than the Jedi, the Sith, and all the petty squabbles within the galaxy. In essence..." She drew her hand away from the ripple, letting it close.

"I am offering you the chance to become a Celestial."

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

She began to explain in detail about what she understood so little of. It was a strange but fascinating lesson. As many of her lessons under Vanessa's hand had been. Teetering to the point of foreboding warning as a path previously hidden was laid bare to the galaxy. The ripples had seemed like an anomaly with which most would avoid, but the mere tug seemed such little effort to reveal what was them.

The sarcasm was not missed as she let her expression drop to annoyance.

"Continue to make." The words dry as she walked alongside her mentor and listened.

The last words at first did not solidly settle into Sasmay's mind. Did not process until a moment later when her singular eye shifted to her mentor.

"I. Won't I just become another dangerous being. Like Abeloth I mean?" She had no understanding of what truly made the wretched being, but Vanessa's words made her pause.

"You said she was given the same power but trapped within a mortal mind of excess. I'm not the worst person in the galaxy. But, I'm no saint either." She was confused, and more so concerned about being as terrible as Abeloth sounded rather than being granted the power.

She knew herself well enough in that moment to pause and question at least.

"I would rather want and never have, than have and waste or abuse."

 

[Onrai]

“Abeloth’s corruption was, at the core, caused by her selfish motivations - and in a way, what she was.” Onrai explained. “She was the last vestige of goodness spawned from the chthonic harbinger of evil that was the Soulworm, El’Shuddem. The corrupt remains of what was the old Onrai. When she drank and bathed, she became aware of what she came from, the gnosis of her experience awakening an instinct for evil within her that led to her isolation and only further festered those destructive tendencies within.”

She placed a hand on Sasmay’s shoulder. “You are not like her. Your origin is simple and known, nothing to be awakened there. Even if suddenly a rush of knowledge comes forth, knowledge of whatever your original purpose was as an experiment in Carnifex’s malicious laboratory, his vision is nothing like that of the great evils before him. And unlike the Son, or the Daughter, or the Father, I am not afraid of what you will become. As you change, as you become such a nascent godling, I promise I will be there to guide your path and will never abandon you to such a horrid fate, to be tempted by the darkest thoughts of gods and men. Not now, and not ever.”

Onrai’s hand was offered to Sasmay as she pondered which of the two places to take her first.

“I suppose an important question is, however - what is more important of the two, knowledge or power?”

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

The explanation went a ways toward easing the nerves she felt about the next experience she would take part in. That would change her forever going forward. While she was created for the express purpose of another, she had experienced life in a different way that shaped her to be what she was today.

Not a bleeding heart, but far from what had been her express purpose before

"I should have a bit more faith in myself then with what you have said." The self reflection had been an almost stalemate argument. Perhaps because she believed herself to be less than others because of what she lacked. Or perhaps exasperated when she had figured out what her true purpose was meant to be.

The feeling of having to cross that bridge with Carnifex an eventuality rather than something that could be avoided forever.

The extended hand was taken slowly, hesitant only as she filtered through her own mind for the answer. Power helped to stem the tide of what was to occur. But knowledge was a weapon in an of itself if applied properly. Those with power easily swayed to one side or another by those with knowledge.

Understanding and foresight coming to the front of her thoughts as she finally produced an answer.

"Knowledge. Power will come in time." She informed her mentor. Swallowing the nervous energy that crept into her upper body at the idea of being changed into something else. Different and unknown.

"Power will always be waiting in some way or another. The void of power is never long. But knowing and understanding can be found in high demand everywhere." She expressed the reasoning without being asked.

 

[Onrai]

“Wise words.” She said. “There are many who would not have pondered as you did and who would have said ‘power’ without a second thought. And it is for that your first step has been decided.” From the ripple, the two began to walk towards a dank grotto a short distance outside the settlement of the ruins, before arriving - there was a pool of water there, clear, not stagnant, but dark.

“You wouldn’t think much of this place if you didn’t know what it was.” Onrai said, motioning to the pool itself. “Knowledge of the past, present, and future is allegedly for the taking of whoever it is that bathes in its waters, though there is no proof that is actually true. It does have a remarkable effect, a transformative effect - in your case, the first of two.”

She stepped aside and provided Sasmay with a direct line to the sort of pathway leading into the waters of the pool. They were not here for visions of futures yet to come, or of guidance - they were here for Sasmay’s own benefits. “You may go in clothed, or if you wish to disrobe, I will take care of them while you bathe. If you wish for me to baptize you with the waters of the pool, I will do so. Imbibe in what it offers you at your own discretion.” She said, a pair of stones rising up from the surface of the earth as Onrai sat down on one of them to wait for her student’s decision.

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

There was a sort of affirming pleasure that came from the words. Power was always the notion she had heard strung across the galaxy for one reason or another. Seldom few sought the knowing of when and why to apply their power, instead intending to rule without the knowing.

A cycle that perhaps she might have unwittingly hoped to break.

They moved on, the grotto before her almost too plain to be some long forgotten thing of immense divine purpose. The explanation was put forth, options listed before her as the singular eye fixated itself on the pool.

"Very well." Was the simplest answer she gave. Shedding her clothing and setting it aside as she lingered over her eye patch. It was removed finally, the strange sensation of air hitting skin in the grotto almost making her flinch at first.

The eye, long disused and lacking true sight opened. Half of her vision blurred as though staring into starlight. Even shapes were skewed as she wobbled forward and eventually into the pool itself. Cool against her skin, the initial chill gave way to a comfortable sensation of growing warmth.

Up to her neck, she slipped forward to the center before turning over in the water. Passive and waiting for something to happen as she dipped lower into the water.

"I thi-" She made to speak as her words froze. The sensation of her mind being swept elsewhere taking conscious thought from her as her form floated inside the waters. Her face visible before slowly sinking down to be completely covered.

As though being held, she did not feel the need to breath in that long moment. She'd heard of augmentations that altered one's perception of time, but only to the point of slowing the events around a person to a crawl.

Within that breath it felt as though everything had frozen in place. The water encompassed her, a rush of new and old filtering into her as scenes of some other time slowly played before her eyes. No. Not her eyes.

As though a dream played itself without the need for sleep. The view switched, the same time but at different angles. She wanted to make a sound. To make it stop. It was overwhelming as it went on. The knowing and experience of what had come before playing through itself in her mind as it had done for another.

She could understand why the being had gone mad with what transpired as she floated in the water. The slow descent into the water ceased before her form slowly began to rise, events that had not yet come to pass filtering through. Once more, faces she did not know passing before her mind as though the separate grains of sand in a great dune sea.

Nothing by themselves, but amidst the others made the sea what it was. Made the galaxy in what they believed to be their own image. And failed so thoroughly to understand the nature of the galaxy to both erase and immortalize their contributions in some way.

Nothing stayed the same and yet everything was as it had been before. A paradoxical state of existence that was only allowed by the balance of what guided everything. Her form slowly shifted beneath the water, a small twist to her body as she ascended in the same slow cadence that she had descended. The wish for knowledge slowly being imparted before she rose to the surface and rocked forward.

Not wasting another second, her hands found the edge of the pool before clambering out and onto the floor. Not feeling the cold, her mind made her shudder attemtempting to decipher everything as a strange feeling began to form in the extremities of her body.

"That. Wasn't. What I. Expected." Her teeth chattered as memories and visions racked her, hands shaking as she pushed herself up before carefully standing completely.

 

[Onrai]

“Only two others are known to have ever bathed here. Neither of them are with us to tell what we could have expected.” A hand raised and a warm wind rushed into the grotto, blowing the last droplets of dampness off of Sasmay’s bare flesh as Onrai handed her back her clothing. She stared at the bare eye, now finally exposed to the elements for the first time since the former pirate had become her apprentice. A part of her desired to ask about it, but she chose not to say anything as Sasmay regained her modesty.

“Now we must make haste to the Font of Power.” She said, offering a supporting arm if Sasmay was unable to walk the journey herself.

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

The warm wind was a blessing that helped her find balance. A deep breath filled her lungs, taking the clothing back and donning them once more.

Her acid marred eye stared blankly. The whole thing warped by some dark creatures blood before it was covered by the patch she wore so often. The strange feeling slowly warming the parts it had filled as she felt the first wave of nausea sweep through her stomach and then move to a sort of vertigo through her senses.

The offered hand was taken as she wobbled in place.

"Some. Something. Change. Quick. Was what she could manage as they moved for their second destination. Her eye blinked, remembering to keep it open than give into the urge to close it. More than once she had learned the hard way that shutting her vision only made the feeling worse. Once on a successful drop from a ground supporting vessel when she'd been flight-sick. Attempting to gain composure only to quickly lose it.

Another time with the Agents upon the use of a force object that made near instantaneous travel occur.

Sasmay did her best to remain upright, but even throughout their hastened pace, she found herself leaning into Vanessa more and more as the feelings grew.

 

[Onrai]

As her footsteps grew more and more tempestuous, and less an less stable, Onrai provided more support for her student as they once more traveled past the ripple. They would go through it in time, but not yet. First there was the matter of one other thing.

Onrai was practically dragging Sasmay by the time the duo reached the fountain. It as the same as it had been the last time she had been here with Joycelyn Zambrano some years back. The power returned to it from the vestiges of Akala’s blood whose stains were lifted from the old robe Onrai’s mortal self had worn during her killing had matured, and once more the ancient fountain bubbled and rippled with power.

Onrai sat Sasmay down next to the font before burying a hand deeply into the dirt. A flash of steam exuded itself from the planet’s surface as she pulled out the form of a simple handleless cup that looked to have been made of fired clay. The dust and dirt recoiled from it as though it were water on hydrophobic polymer as she took the cup and placed it beneath one of the arcs of water of the fountain, the cup filled to the brim as she carefully and cautiously brought it to Sasmay’s lips.

“Drink, but only drink this. Do not go for more and do not drink directly from the fountain.” She said, her instructions clear. “When you are done, dash the cup against the ground and break it so the temptation to go for more is lost from you. You will have imbibed what you needed.”

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

The trek was made difficult by her stumbling and weakening form. Half senseless by the time Vanessa had sat her down and produced something from the ground beneath them. Her eye focusing on the cup before her finally as it was pressed to her lips.

The water was welcome.

Her hand slowly grasped the cup, taking a slow sip first before feeling the relief it brought to her senses. Drinking deep, it was drained before she fully recognized it was gone. Her mind now racing on as the feeling of nausea and vertigo briefly ceased in a strange sensation of the two burning themselves out.

The sudden void of those feelings tempted her to sink the cup within the well once more. If only to keep the feelings at bay as the sensation of warmth seemed to spread quicker. With a sense of urgency now as the sick confusion doubled down to her surprise. The urgency to dip the cup making her hand waver against the instructions of her mentor.

The one who had brought her here. Had helped her along the path they took together in a fashion. Had warned her against such an action. But the relief from those sensations made it hard to heed the warning. Her wavering hand tilted toward the fountain once more, body begging for the relief as the words of warning finally won out.

She felt worse than even when Domino had left her. The drunken stupor only lasting as long as the reserve of alcohol had allowed. No amount had burned out that feeling of loneliness and emptiness. Could likely ever do that. But in this moment, those feelings were overshadowed by the trio of sensations she was feeling as another slowly crept into her.

The slow consuming burn that started along her nerves. Made her fingers and toes curl against the sudden and sharp pain.

The cup was thrown against the ground as she cried out. Needing to let out the pain in a way she had only ever found in her loneliness to be successful. She screamed, tears forming against the conflicting feelings that tossed any sense from her.

She did not here the smash of the vessel that had delivered the drink to her mouth as it spread against the ground beside her. Senses aflame with confusion and focused keenly on her mentors voice throughout the pain and nausea.

 

[Onrai]

Onrai’s arms gently wrapped around the form of Sasmay cautiously and carefully as she kept the woman closely in her embrace, the changes within her flesh bubbling and felt by the primordial as she sought to take her a student to the final place she would need to journey. She picked Sasmay up and began to carry her, arm over the back of her legs to keep her in place and her head given enough room that any sensations of nausea that turned into true stomach churning would not end up splashing onto Onrai herself.

Soon the duo traveled through the ripple and entered the world of Mortis. Though the journey felt like only a few minutes, Onrai had taken a great deal of time to get to their destination: a gaping hole leading down deeper to the magma-filled core of the planet. This was the Well of the Dark Side, and it was where the last stage of her transformation would take place.

Seated upon the symbol of darkness etched into the bottom of the chasm, lava lighting their existence, Onrai sat down across from her apprentice, assuming a more monstrous tentacular form. Mists began to swirl about the two of them, dark essence congealing as Onrai prepared for the final and most difficult portion of the entire experience.

“Feed from the darkness here. Let it nourish you and ensure that the final stage of your ascension to godhood is one that leaves you with no lasting marks. You may either use me as a conduit, or try and draw from the power here yourself. Know that if something goes wrong… I did my best for you.”

Sasmay Cull

 

[Sasmay Cull]

WEAPONS: Lightsaber
EQUIPMENT: Personal Robes
TAGS: Onrai
LOCATION: On Abeloth's Planet

The trip was marked by the wrenching form of Sasmay held in Onrai's arms. Convulsions beginning to take hold as they descended to the core in a hurried but cautious way. She only became sick once on the way. A victory she would not recall as she lay upon the symbol in the ground as her presence sang along the same vein as the dark energy around her.

Like a beacon, the dark energy slowly filled the vessel that called to it. A tenuous reach of her limited focus extending to Onrai as her rock for the process rather than leaning on her so heavily as she had done earlier. Her transformation began when her essence began to shine beneath the robes that adorned her physical body. Arms wrapping around herself as her form became covered in the energies that swirled and danced in a chaotic dance. The nausea shifted to something else. A hunger filled feeling as she absorbed what filled the area around her.

The vertigo in lockstep with it, changing from a distortion of her senses to a feeling of being outside of herself. Her skin twisted, muscles aching as parts of her body began to writhe without her beckoning. The pain threatening to undermine her focus as she screamed once more. The feeling lancing the certainty that she held onto like a shield against the consumption she felt along her body.

Pieces flaked away. The dark energy beginning to tear away at the physical, and what remained as it did beginning to fade as she drew closer to buckling beneath the weight of her decision. Both empowered and overwhelmed, her hold on the process waned as she felt the world sweep her up into itself, promising absolution through annihilation.

Peace through inaction. Relief through acceptance. An end to the struggle that severed a physical limb and swept it away into the air before it broke into nothing upon the altar. She wanted to accept the offer. The knowing it would relent if she gave in tempting her down the path as her leg was removed and eventually dissipated.

Tears streamed as her voice broke, silence dominating the chamber as she wondered about her reason. Questioned her resolve. Doubted herself in the harshest fashion.

She had never been worthy of others. Never been worth the effort it took for them to remain. Had pushed everyone away to mitigate the chance of their abandonment. To absolve herself of the need to feel guilt, anger, and grief. What made her worthy of this? What made her worthy of ascension? To be granted such a gift as this? She had nothing, and would yet be nothing still.

The thoughts sabotaging her strength as the energy began to consume her wholly before Vanessa. The small tether of her mental reach drawing tight as she remembered the training beneath others. The time they had taken to show her with their actions that she was indeed worth something.

A reminder that things outside of their control sometimes drew them away.

The dark side faltered as she drew in a sharp breath, the last vestiges of her physical body flaking into nothing as a new form slowly solidified from the swirling energy. Strength flooded her mind, resolve burning out the self loathing that had nearly drowned her. Had nearly snuffed her out against what she perceived to be the end. Perceived to be a greater thing than what she had been gifted.

Even knowing she had been a product of someone else's machinations did not sway the weight of her newly formed conviction. Stubbornness and willingness stifling the last bits of her doubt.

Slowly but surely, the shape focused itself, drawing the darkness about it like a mantle. Her hair flowed out in the swirling energy, caught in a gale that swept her form into existence beneath her mentors gaze. The dark strands shimmering like starlight against the lave light around them.

Skin dipped and drawn from ebony formed where she once lay. The long limbs of her form extending out of the shallow wells of energy that had been feasting upon her form. All slowly bringing her back into the real as a ragged breath was drawn from her new body.

She was worth something.

Three eyes opened as the energy slowly lessened, her form draped in shadow as the gale diminished into nothing. The sharp light of the raw life energy of the planet around them illuminating the new form she had taken from the energies that had tried to consume her.

She coughed, curling upright in wavering strength. Trying to reach the one that had guided her along the path.

 

[Onrai]

Onrai’s steps over to the newly formed primordial being could not have been faster as her transition from tentacles monstrosity to humanoid was so rapid one would have assumed it occurred within a blink. Her arms wrapped firmly around Sasmay, a tight embrace showcasing the care, the appreciation, the thankfulness she had that her beloved student had broken free of her doubts and become by all accounts a being like herself.

“Sasmay?” She asked, curious as to whether or not the process of shedding her old self, in this case quite literally, had done anything to change the personality of the woman whom she had cleaved close to as a peer above all others.

Sasmay Cull