Junction The Sundering Dawn – Act IV: The Last Turn of Calladene (SO/DIA/RNR Junction of Noe'ha'on/Wielu)

[Darth Empyrean]

Tag | Avel Som // Kaila Irons // Darth Amaymon // Raef Malstadt // Diarch Reign // Quinn Varanin // Darth Carnifex // Darth Prazutis // Srina Talon

"Then I expect great things.", he said, choosing not to comment on all else Darth Amaymon said. It was true, Empyrean was once something, but no longer. All that remained was hate, wrapped in the form of a corpse.

Their journey was short, room after room filled with Starweirds that threatened to consume them - phase through their weapons, struck down by the Force, again and again as hordes of them became as thick as the walls they were surrounded by. Empyrean had lifted his staff, surrounding them in a sphere of darkness that prevented the vast majority from entering - but not all. It was taxing enough as is, but Kala'anda kept him power efficient, strong.

They entered a cathedral of broken light, impossibly vast. Suspended above, like a black sun torn from time, was a central singularity—its surface pulsed and cracked, filled with violet veins and slick tendrils of negation. It spun slowly, and from it, Starweirds poured in reverse—cascading up into containment, as though rewound from slaughter.

At its heart, anchored in coils of fractal bone and obsidian flesh, it awaited them.

Not a beast. Not a mind. A will.

The Alpha.

It opened its eyes—each a window into false futures—and reality shivered.

Empyrean frowned, jaw tightening as he stared into the being that had once feasted on the minds of navigators, on Jedi temples forgotten by the stars. A scream clawed at the inside of his skull, but it could not yet pass his lips.

Then he named it.

"Nezzhàrûl."

The word broke like a curse across the chamber, echoing in the Force.
"He Who Unravels Time."
"The Thirteenth Echo."
"The Star That Drowns Its Own Light."

He raised his hand—and the darkness followed.

 

[The King in Red]

Tag | Avel Som // Kaila Irons // Darth Amaymon // Raef Malstadt // Diarch Reign // Quinn Varanin // Darth Carnifex // Darth Prazutis // Srina Talon

The sound was not a roar.

It was the memory of one—heard backward, scraped through the ribcage of a dying god.

When Empyrean named it, Nezzhàrûl stirred for the first time in a thousand years. The black sun at the chamber's center convulsed, and cracks spiderwebbed along its surface, disgorging waves of molten shadow that flared and died midair like perished stars. From the creature's core came a tremor in the Force—not light, not darkness, but the void between.

The Alpha screamed.

Not with sound, but with intent.

And all across Calladene, the Starweirds answered.

They came like a psychic flood. From ducts, from vents, from the cracks in folded metal and the folds of uncollapsed time. Silvery, shrieking aberrations with arms like daggers and faces that remembered too much. Dozens became hundreds. Hundreds blurred into thousands. The strike team's rearward path vanished under a tide of unbeing—phantasms that twisted through bulkheads and illusions of form, some carrying echoes of the strike team's own faces, distorted and rotted with future death.

And then Nezzhàrûl moved.

A single arm lifted—longer than logic, jointed like a broken metronome—and the light around it froze. No photons passed. The chamber dimmed not because of darkness, but because meaning was being drained from light itself. Where the Alpha pointed, a member of the forward line was struck—not with fire, not with lightning, but with an unmaking: armor turned to sand, flesh to fog, mind to echo.

The Alpha did not charge.

It expanded.

A second scream shattered orientation—voices rang out of sync, each word spoken by the strike team now echoed a full second before it was said. Weapons began to drag behind their own motion. Some felt themselves blink sideways in space—three feet to the left, then back again—as if the battlefield no longer recognized where they stood.

And still the swarm came.

Starweirds crashed like silver surf across the radius of Empyrean's protective sphere, clawing against the outer shell of shadow. Some phased through it, squealing in fractured tongues; one lunged and bit into a trooper's arm, howling as it died. Their hunger was total. Their fear—nonexistent.

Nezzhàrûl had declared the duel.

Not with words.

But by making the world itself wrong.

 

[Serina Calis]

"The Rewrite Begins."

Tags - OBJECTIVE 3: Lirka Ka [OPEN]



For a time, Serina said nothing.

The sound of Lirka's heavy footfalls and the sharp clink of one more thermal charge striking the crystalline floor echoed through the ever-tightening corridor of Nullity. Here, the Archive seemed to forget what light was—no more warm pulses, no guiding auras or illusionary futures projected like tempting ghosts. The walls were obsidian and inert, swallowing both sound and intent. Even the distant humming—omnipresent since they'd entered Calladene—dulled to a low, skeletal pressure on the skull.

When Serina finally answered, it came not as a riposte, nor as a performance. It came like gravity. Subtle, unarguable, and cold.

"Happiness is a child's question."

Her voice was quieter now, but still deliberate—like she was carefully choosing which part of herself would answer.

"And a child's metric."

She didn't look at Lirka as she walked—didn't need to. Her focus was forward, her hands clasped behind her back in a posture too regal to be casual. Tyrant's Embrace hissed softly with each step, the scaled plates of her armor adjusting to the irregular geometry around them. Her eyes—those six inhuman slits—remained focused on the vanishing point of the Null Path, where even time itself seemed hesitant to continue.

"I know contentment. I know satisfaction. I know victory. I know… progress." The last word lingered in her mouth like a sacred chant. "But happiness?" She finally turned her head, not quite looking back, but enough to cast her voice into the air behind her like a challenge.

"Tell me, Lirka Ka—have you ever once met a happy god?"

She let the silence stretch again, just long enough to make it sharp.

"No. They are too busy reshaping the world to enjoy it."

Then she turned back toward the black corridor and continued, each step more deliberate than the last.

"I sacrificed any chance of happiness long ago."

And as the Null Path swallowed them fully, even that voice began to fade into the dark—like the last echo of something divine, choosing form over comfort, dominion over peace.

The Null Path ended, as all things did.

Before them stood a door—not a typical structure, but a conceptual barrier, rendered in obsidian and lightless metal, embedded with veins of some mineral that shimmered in anti-color. It had no handle. No keypad. No seams. Just a monolith taller than Lirka, broader than any freighter hatch, carved with markings so ancient even the Force hesitated to translate them. The air was still, as if breath itself had been forbidden here. There was no sound now, not even the hum of power.

A threshold. A judgment.

Serina stopped, her head tilting just slightly, studying the surface like a predator circling an unkillable prey. Her fingers hovered near the edge of the door—not touching. Not yet. The script glowed faintly in her presence, then dimmed again, unimpressed.

She exhaled softly, and the sound was strangely loud in the silence.

"This is not a door," she said aloud, as if to herself. "It's an equation… but one written in perception."

Her claws flexed slightly.

"It will not open because we wish it. It will not open because we knock."

She turned slightly toward Lirka, eyes flickering.

"It must be understood—or it must be dominated."

Then she approached again, and without hesitation, she placed her palm against the obsidian.

There was no reaction.

Instead, the Archive spoke.

Not in sound—but in reality.

Lirka and Serina both felt it: pressure in their minds, cold fingers peeling at the layers of thought. An interlacing of knowledge and judgment. The Archive wasn't barring them—it was asking.

Words formed, not in Basic, but in pure meaning, pulsing through their skulls like an unspoken tongue.

"Speak your name, and the truth it hides."
"Speak your desire, and the lie it requires."
"Speak your purpose, and the paradox it contains."

Then nothing.

No guidance. No hint. Just expectation.

Serina slowly withdrew her hand and turned to Lirka.

"It wants three truths, wrapped in contradictions."

A smirk under her helm. Wry. Dark.

"How fortunate. We're built on nothing else."

She stepped back and made a small, graceful motion—inviting.

"Would you like to go first, High Priestess?"

"Or shall the Serpent lie to the mirror first?"

 

[Lily Decoria]

Location: Calldene (Objective 2)
Outfit: Jedi Attire
Equipment: Arwr Da (Main Crossguard Lightsaber), Hydrangea Moonblade (concealed secondary Lightsaber)
Tag: Briana Sal-Soren | Tasia Palpatine | Vytal Noctura | Merion Oreno | Pel Grennin

Lily looked over to her Master when she heard the very dry reply to her joking comment, she had expected something more aligned with what Tasia had stated but clearly there was a lot more concern on Briana's mind than she was letting on. "Apologies for coming across vain, Master. I only meant to lighten the mood with some friendly humour." Lily explained in a calm apologetic tone. She did spot the sideways smile and the added comment, letting out a sigh of relief that she had not fumbled too hard. "Well, a Jedi does not believe in coincidences was something I read, Master."

Hearing Briana call out for them get a move on, Lily jumped forward behind Briana, keeping close to her Master as Lily attempted to figure out where she would be best suited in order to help. Her abilities were best against a physical opponent but this all seemed Force based, Lily was grateful for her crystals that helped strengthen her connection with the Force. It gave her some edge with her abilities.

Then a witch called out to them, seeking someone who could offer assistance. Lily wasn't too sure that her abilities in the Force were quite what Vytal was seeking but Lily knew that they needed to get into action. Looking to Briana, Lily let her Master guide her and tell her where to be. While they were working with other factions equally to solve the issue, Lily was always first going to defer to the orders that her Master stated. She breathed in deeply, calming her mind and using her combat meditation mindset to access the Force and work in tandem with Briana best she could.

 

[Kaila Irons]

Tag: Darth Empyrean Quinn Varanin Darth Amaymon Avel Som

"We don't have time for this." muttered Kaila.

The bickering was quickly tuned out as she charged forward, each step clanking against the alien structure under the weight of metal bones wreathed in muscle both biological and artificial.

Upon entering the safety of The Emperor's dark sphere, the young Asharim-prospect prepared magic of her own.

Drawing a violet saber, she held her gloved hand close to the blade, injecting it with needles of dark energy which fed into it's unique crystal, coating the blade in a black shimmer that could harm their incorporeal enemies.

Kaila remained silent for the rest of battle towards the Cathedral, focused entirely on cutting down specters.


Fighting into the Alpha's lair had gone by in a flash, everything that came before it paling in comparison.

Breath left her in exodus.

She was not the infinitely powerful sorcerer that her master was, she could not fight men like him nor did Kaila believe herself worthy of this undertaking. Through her crimson visor she stared up at a God which saw only a black-clad speck. It reminded her so much of when she first saw Darth Carnifex .

But in this moment when doubt should have crushed her, she remembered the words of her fellow prospect:

"It's a good first lesson - to always bet on yourself and never tell yourself the odds. It only gets in the way."

It mirrored her master's teachings in a more positive light, a mantra by which she emptied her mind of all but war;

"A sith is not controlled by fear, fear is controlled by the sith," she began to mutter.

The starweirds came in hordes that surely no conventional army could hope to stand against, yet she stood firm.

"Through these teachings do I become iron minded,"

"So too is—Ngh!"

A second scream tore through the chamber and reality itself. Kaila transformed her saber in a series of clicks and sparks, the hilt extending into a staff of phrik with which she used to steady herself.

And when she spoke again, it was louder and joined by desynced echoes as though led in a battlefield prayer.

"So too is my body tempered in a crucible named pain."

But this was no plea for salvation, a prayer to no god.

It was a prayer to empty the mind of Kaila and fill it with one power she could always trust, always bet on. The very thing she had become in order to survive everything the Sith had thrown at her.

Anathemous.​

"I am Iron"​

"Iron within"​

​

"I am Iron within"



"I am Iron within."​

"Iron without"​

"I am Iron without."​

​

​

​

​

​

"I am Iron without"​

And as her prayer reached it's crescendo, a wave of hellfire shot forth.

​

 

[Tasia Palpatine]

Location: Calldene: Objective 2
Carrying: Palpatine's Saber, Hunting gear, Kiffar Blade, Underwater breather
Wearing: Raiments of Shiraya
Tag: Briana Sal-Soren Lily Decoria . Vytal Noctura Merion Oreno Pel Grennin
Also accompanied by Yasima Zyntra who weilds Yasima's embrace

"I don't think you are meant to be considering violence right now." came a voice from next to Tasia, her padawan knew her too well, when the dark siders started talking as if the Jedi should follow their lead the chance to take the opportunity and end some of them did cross her mind, it was only natural, but the Jedi in her did not allow genuine contemplation of it. She smirked and raised an eyebrow at the younger girl. Before listening to Lily, there was a lot she liked about that woman.

"Watch my back while I enter the meditation." she said shutting her eyes and adding he power to the rest, she could feel the presence of the gears. Yasima nodded to her master and ignited her blade. Dark tendrils of energy were everywhere trying to attack the light siders presence but the Shirayans were like beacons in the storm and helps add a measure of control and precision to the blind but powerful strength of the dark ones. One of the undead was loose from the pack and walked by Tasia, she felt the humming power of her apprentice's lightsaber nearby as Yasima protected her from the dark stray, she trusted the girl with her life while they sought to protect the universe.

There was a deep and resonating shudder as the next gear moved position and the force users inched closer to their final goal. She reached out to feel for Briana Sal-Soren and Lily Decoria knowing they were still active.

 

[Avel Som]

---

" I'll show you all what it means to be Sith."

Avel Som had no idea who this berserker was, but he was rather amused by him, watching in fascination, arms stretched idly behind his head. "Awesome. Could always use a few pointers for one I become one myself."

Darkwing had been watching and paying attention to how the titan battled the starweird. The ebon hawk flew up, creating a whirlwind of hurricane winds and red lightning that began striking out and leaping between the wights. The raptor pulled more and more from the Darkness, his eyes glowing like a bled Kyber crystal. He summoned shadows that swallowed his prey whole. "Excellent job, Darkwing! That will help keep them off..."

Avel Som's words were cut off as, right as Kaila Irons launched a wave of fire out, corporeal began to morph. "Again?" He felt it too. Darkwing began phasing from corporeal to incorporeal and back. His legs elongated, arms growing from his chest and turning to the side as his wings twisted around to his back. What was left was a creature that looked a lot like a black starweird with glowing red eyes, a beaked mouth, and ebon-feathered wings. Darkwing the Darkweird, Avel Som could not help but think.

Darkwing let out his own telepathic screech, one aimed to affect only the starweird. The ghoulish beings around him buckled, not being used to having their own abilities redirected at them. Then, he lashed out, his claws ripping into them. It did not matter if they tried to phase, because he could too. Darkwing would show them who the true predators were as he worked with the other Sith that were keeping the endless horde at bay.

---

Avel Som turned toward the Alpha, shaking his head of amazement. He had his own target to focus on.

"Nezzhàrûl."

That was what the Emperor had said. After that, Avel Som had no idea what was going on. It was as if he could not see, could not move, though he knew he was. Then he was moving in reverse, then in afterimages where he could not tell which was himself. His brain could not make sense of anything, as if logic -- or even reality itself -- no longer made sense, and his mind was screaming out and trying to rebel against such wrongness. He then felt -- no, sensed -- something hit him. There was no pain, no physical sensation, just that he knew something was happening. His very cells were being ripped apart, as if to be unmade.

In that moment, Avel Som felt something within him break. He found himself floating in a void of black and red.

"We must fight."

"How did he do this? What did he do!?"

"How did he consume me; I should have consumed him, possessed him."

Anger and rage swirled all around as Avel Som looked into the face of... himself? His doppelganger opened its eyes and stared at him with hatred. "You have left me in the worst place to be. I do not know why I cannot possess you or escape your body. It seems your soul has latched onto mine like a parasite and is slowly eating me away." The look-alike then laughed. "Almost exactly what I was trying to do to you."

Sorry, but it seems like it was your fault, then.

The thing struck out, grabbing him by the throat, attempting futilely to strangle him. "AND NOW, I EITHER LET YOU CONSUME ME AND USE MY POWER, OR I LET YOU DIE AND CEASE TO EXIST MYSELF! AND I HATE YOU BECAUSE OF IT!"

Nah, I'll be fine.

The doppelganger screamed with rage, a screamed that dwarfed the starweird creams.

Avel Som found himself back inside Calladene. He knew he had never really left, only that his cells were fighting to pull themselves back together and resist whatever the Alpha had done. The neurons in his brain were also resisting and adapting. He began to fine himself able to move. Not well, but it was something. He felt Darkwing bolstering him through their shared bond. Something told him to lift his left hand toward the monstrous alpha, and he did. Energy began flowing into him. He could feel his body supercharged like never before. He cranked up his nervous system way beyond the limits he normally could and charged the Alpha in a mad blitz of Dark side rage and aggression, moving so fast he could not even keep up with his own movements. It did not matter. He let his body move itself as he attacked in an aerial assault of blows from his vibroblade in right hand and revolver in left.

---

TAGS: OPEN
Darth Empyrean The King in Red Kaila Irons Darth Amaymon ​

 

[Taeli Raaf]

Objective III - The Celestial Archive
Accompanying - Persephone Dashiell
​

For most of the crisis that had been unfolding in the galaxy, she had been focusing mostly on holding things together on the domestic front. Whether it was making sure lines of communication and travel continued in the Commonwealth or dealing with disruptions in Sith space, she had been content to allow others to fix the issues plaguing the galaxy while she worked on stability for after. She had still been reading the reports and when the source of the increased number of starweirds and the spatial disruptions to real space and hyperspace was a Celestial construct, her interests had been piqued.

She wasn't the only one.

Yes, there were many Jedi and Sith and conventional forces fighting to bring the crisis to the end, but so far only a select few had been interested in something else hidden on Calladene. A full and intact Celestial archive, one from the height of their domination of the galaxy and the Force, had been discovered on the construct. That had immediately drawn her full and undivided attention. The research and studies on Mortis she and Kaine had undertaken, on top of their secret research on Remnicore, would benefit greatly from whatever knowledge could be gleaned from the crystalline spires that acted as data storage for the Celestials. The secrets that could be found... the knowledge... oh it was so exciting.

She had sensed Serina Calis and Lirka Ka also near the archives, but they were undergoing a different trial and sought something entirely different to what Taeli and her young companion were seeking. She had been surprised when Persephone asked to accompany her, and she had promised the girl's father she would watch out for her. As they explored the tunnel they were in, and reached the first barricade, she pondered the girl's question.

"I'm sure there might be a way a non-Force Sensitive could access the archives, but it would likely be much harder, my dear," she replied, studying the door. It demanded knowledge of multiple disciplines, to understand more than one side of the great mystery. "Luckily for us, we don't need to wrack out brains to figure that out presently."

From her left hand, an orb of light side energy would appear, golden light emitting a soft hue against the crystals around them. In her right hand, blue and black flames born of the dark side would condense into a similar sphere, no heat coming from the flames, just an increasing and unnatural chill. She would place both spheres of Force energy against the door and begin rotating them slowly, following grooves that were barely visible.

"The Celestials believed foremost in balance, at least the ones we know about from the stories of the Mortis gods. Light and dark must be balanced in equal measures to go deeper. As the galaxy must be balanced, as it seems this construct was designed to be a failsafe for."

As she spoke, the Force energies would slowly fill the grooves, forming into a symbol of balance of light and dark. The entryway began to glow along other lines as the energies were fed into the mechanism.

 

[Darth Nathrax]

Objective III: The Celestial Archive
Tags: <Open>

---

In the ever shifting maze of the gear world, there was an archive, this was the prize the Diarchs wanted. For what ends was anyone's guess, but it mattered very little. He wanted the wonders of the Celestials to himself, to see the Dark Side in its purest form. Death was the mistress of Nathrax's cult, and her secrets only released themselves to those who passed through the final veil. Perhaps, he thought, there was some kind of clue to death's greatest secrets somewhere in these archives? New paths that no mortal had ever fathomed, one could only hope so.

He had already lost a good dozen troopers in his retinue to the mind-bending landscape of this place, those that weren't killed were driven mad by what they saw deep within the tunnels. Nathrax had already seen the horrors of the dark, and his mind couldn't be driven much further into the depths of insanity. Instead, the Sith began to progress by himself, guided to the massive crystalline structure by some sense he couldn't name. It was as if he was being drawn by some siren call, purpose guiding each step.

Under his mask the Nagai began to smile at the thought of obtaining the secrets of the universe, unraveling ways to punish the Light. Each step down the corridors brought him closer to that objective, closer to true enlightenment! Then, he began to hear sounds, people speaking in voices he'd never heard. The echoes of these voices seemed to be present everywhere, resounding off the walls as he walked. He couldn't quite make out everything, but they spoke of events past and future. Some where screams, others were casual conversation. It was strange, alien, and quite irritating.


Pushing past the voices only brought him to a walkway suspended high above room below. In this room, he saw two figures working at a door. He considered making a move to kill the two, but he saw light appear from one's hand, and decided to watch instead. He was a predator examining prey, what would happen now?

 

[Diarch Reign]

Objective I​

Tags: Darth Empyrean Kaila Irons Darth Amaymon Avel Som

---

Reign would be the first to admit, he did not relish the prospect of working alongside Darth Empyrean , especially so soon after their clash upon the surface of Serenno. Yet the fate of the galaxy had called for armistice and cooperation.

And as much as he hated to admit it, having clashed power against power with the being, Reign had faith that together, alongside those gathered here, he and the emperor could put an end to this “Alpha”.

As Empyrean cleared the first chamber with ease, Reign noted, perhaps for the first time since he’d come into contact with the corpse, that it looked worse for wear. The thought rattled the Diarch. If a being so powerful could be put at wind here, they were all in danger.

There would be no holding back. As they entered the alpha chamber, Reign noted with some amusement the minor confrontation between the emperor and the large beserker.

“How typical of the Sith”
he said to himself. But he would not insult at this time. The final battle was upon them.

As the Emperor uttered the name of the creature, all hell began to break loose. As the star weird crashed against Empyrean’s protective sphere, Reign knew he had to act. As Kaila Irons launched fire, The Diarch too launched a ball of Force Destruction against the beings. Obliterating those in its path.

As the screams shook the chamber, Reign had to center himself. Focusing in on the lessons of his father, Order above all. Driving his mind to order and strengthening his resolve.

He would aid where could, whether that be to assist against the alpha or hold off the horde. He would do so. For the good of the galaxy.

 

[Laphisto]

The chamber unfolded like memory vast, silent, and impossibly knowing. Laphisto stepped into the heart of the Celestial Archive beside Diarch Rellik . His wings remained half-folded behind his armored frame, and his breath came slow and deliberate. Towering crystalline pylons surrounded them, each one jutting toward the unseen heights like frozen declarations. They did not hum with sound or power. Instead, they resonated with something more abstract thought layered upon thought, as if the walls themselves were remembering their presence.

"This place feels older than war," Laphisto murmured, his voice low and dry. "Older than the Force as we know it." He extended his senses not just through the Force, but into something deeper and stranger. There was no malice in the Archive, but there was purpose. This place did not simply exist; it endured. A distant noise stirred hima low rumble, subtle and nearly missed. His ear twitched upright. Voices. Faint, unfamiliar, coming from somewhere ahead. He turned toward Rellik, intending to speak, but stopped short. Something else had caught his attention.

Near one of the lesser pylons, nestled against a seamless wall of stone, a shard of crystal pulsed faintly. At first glance, it resembled little more than a fracture in the wall silent and inert. But as he stared, its outline shimmered softly, like an afterimage trying to become real. It was not a door. Not exactly. But it remembered being one. Upon its surface, nearly swallowed by age and dust, a symbol had been etched silver, faint, and ancient. Laphisto froze. His breath caught. His talons flexed against the cold stone beneath him. "…That can't be," he whispered.

It was the symbol of the Lilaste Order. His symbol. The very crest he had believed was born from his own vision. crafted from memory, instinct, and purpose. A mark of balance, rebirth, and unity through fire and trial. The sign he had forged as a declaration of identity. Yet here it was. Carved into stone untouched by time. Waiting.

"I saw this," he said quietly, almost to himself. "In visions… during stasis. It came to me like a dream long before I woke in this era." He took a step closer, hesitant at first, then more certain. The Force stirred around him not violently, but reverently, as if some buried mechanism was awakening in his presence. He did not raise a hand. He did not speak a command. He simply stood before the seal.

And the wall responded. The symbol began to glow, silver lines sharpening and expanding. Crystalline layers shifted soundlessly, and a hidden passage unfolded a geometric bloom of light and memory. It did not open like a door, but like a thought being remembered after millennia. Laphisto looked to Rellik, a strange weight behind his eyes. "well then, now that we have found a spooky door bearing what i thought was a symbol of my own making. lets see what we can find out."

 

[Gavin Vel]

Objective 1

Tags: Diarch Reign Darth Empyrean Kaila Irons Darth Amaymon Avel Som

He had been in seclusion far too long. The memories of his defection from the Sith Order had faded into irrelevance, but still he adhered to Reign's commands. Ever the obedient instrument. Gavin was acutely aware of how others perceived him—a feral hound, gradually honed into a weapon by Reign. But he didn’t mind. In fact, he relished it. He had a function, and with it, purpose.

Yet those two years had felt like a prison. The autonomy he once knew at the Academy was gone, supplanted by a regimented existence in the shadows. Though the Sith likely saw him as unworthy of pursuit, Reign had ensured his protection. He had shielded Gavin from retribution and ruin—something the Sith would never have done. They would have discarded him as broken stock. Reign did not. And that loyalty had forged Gavin’s choice.

Now, standing at Reign’s side amidst the tempest of battle, Gavin could feel the old instincts rising—primal, unfiltered. Reign had spent years attempting to temper that recklessness, to discipline the wildfire within him. Gavin believed he had succeeded—until now. Until he stood amidst the chaos and witnessed the unrestrained power of Darth Empyrean. The urge to abandon restraint surged in his veins. His fingers twitched near the hilt of his lightsaber, aching to leap into the fray, to prove himself through violence and dominance.

But he restrained himself. The leash—unseen yet absolute—held him in place. Reign had not given the signal. Gavin’s massive figure remained still, swathed in dark robes, his identity masked for caution’s sake.

"Orders, Master," Gavin said, his voice laced with a dangerous hunger, eyes fixed on Reign as the elder Sith unleashed a devastating blast of Force Destruction into the battlefield. Every fiber of his being screamed for release.

 

[Diarch Reign]

​

Tags: Gavin Vel

---

As the burst of power left his hand, Reign felt drained however. This battle was one of the mind as much as the body.

At his apprentice’s words, Reign looked back a small smile on his face. He knew they protective bubble wouldn’t hold back the horde, some Starweirds had already made their way through. Attacking troopers and acolytes alike.

“Let loose my young friend, show these beasts the result of your training. Destroy anything in your path”

He turned his attention back to the beast closing in on him, his saber in his hand in an instant as he slashed at a being coming his way.

 

[Pel Grennin]

Pel's mind swirled with the Force. It was a turbulent thing here, being co-opted for the machine's end, but the Force willed itself in a direction the machine could not truly guide. An Pel was well acquainted and attuned to the direction of the Force, and how to move with it to get favorable results. Bringing Merion Oreno into the meditation quickly brought the whole operation into synchronicity. Those Pel touched with his meditations did not simply know the answers and orders they'd be given, they understood, and these small details changed meaningfully, allowing the whole unit to act as one.

And soon, Pel was not alone, as the Jedi had arrived, summoned by Pel in hopes of adding them to their objective. Contrary to what his position as Inquisitor would imply, Pel had little disdain for the Jedi. He was not of them, certainly, but he didn't hate them. Merely disagreed. His practices were not opposite, merely different, and so aligning his own Battle Meditation with that of Lily Decoria to amplify the effect. But this was a challenge, as Pel did not know this Jedi. He had the source of information on correcting the world-gear, she did not. His ego, his knowledge, and his experience was a blocker - one he understood, but did not expect the Jedi to. Before they could walk together, she needed to accept that Pel was already here, already prepared, and the darkness he brought with him could look very much like an attack to someone who was not familiar with him.

Align with me, Jedi. We do not have time to dawdle. The sooner we are in accordance, the sooner Calledene is fixed - and the less damage the Sith will cause, Pel instructed. He did not intend on aggression and threats, but he would not suffer foolishness here. He would welcome her help, but it would need to begin on his terms, and they would get to know one another quite well once their meditations had fully merged.

Tasia Palpatine Briana Sal-Soren Vytal Noctura

 

[Diarch Rellik]

With the chamber door opening both leaders stepped in at the same time. Having made their way through a few trials already - they came to realize once one person entered, the chamber immediately changed format before the next could as well. So both Rellik and Laphisto were walking in tandem and close to each other. The humming noise coming from the crystals only broken by the comment from his ally.

"Well if you are saying this place feels old. Than it must be true."

Rellik let out a little laugh before he focused on the voices for a brief moment. Echo's resonating through the chamber from places unknown. Were they voices from memory or created from something he had not known. It was hard to decipher. Almost as if it was being fed through the force to feel homely. It was a trick in the Diarchs mind. Similar to those done by ancient Sith trapped in artifacts trying to overtake ones mind.

Looking to Laphisto he noticed the stunned expression on his face. Turning towards the ground he also saw it. The emblem of the Lilaste order. Out of all the things they had seen since entering this damned structure, it was the logo of the lilaste that raised Relliks eyebrows in shock. He simply thought Wow

"First Kie'vara and now here. It seems history is finding its way back to you more than we are finding it."

With Laph's approach the wall responded and than opened.

"Well who am I to deny an almost certain trap of mythical chance standards. - How kind of you to open the door. Truly a gentleman."

Rellik stepped through first. Taking the risk of spontaneous explosion as only half satire. Upon his entry he was met with a vision. He deemed these must be similar to the ones Laphisto felt on Kie'vara when he was in his trance. It would be fair to say - however he moved her, he would move in the real world or this is the real world just simulated.. somehow.

What he saw was a Dystopian future where the Kie'varan shadow god Saurav'ix had won at some point in time. The people of Laphisto's race were dominating slavers who were taking citizens and placing them into shuttles. It was clear they were to be used as a soul harvest to feed Saurav'ix instationable hunger for power. A never ending cycle of using his strength to overtake another world to keep the never ending conquest going for the god.

Rellik paused at the door. His spear screaming on his back. Taking it to his hand he heard the voice of the warden.

Warden: "We must find a way out of this damned place. We destroyed Saurav'ix. It is a trap played on memories. It must have read the souls of all who entered and deemed this a way to break us. I... WE - will not be broken."

Without pause the Diarch answered.

"Agreed. Laphisto the Warden and I are of one opinion here. This is merely a trick based on our memories to destroy our will. Let us find the exit and continue forward. We wont find the answer to why the sigil was there within this ploy. It will be at the end, as all good puzzles answers are."

Tags: Laphisto

 

[Laphisto]

Laphisto stopped in his tracks the moment he stepped forward. The crystalline Archive around him bled away, replaced by a world bathed in ash and silence a scorched Kiev’ara twisted beneath a sky blackened by fire and shadow.

He inhaled sharply as a tremor of recognition crawled up his spine. With a soft hiss, his lone ear pinned back against his head. His wings gave a tense twitch. Eyes squeezed shut, he stumbled, a clawed hand reaching out for support. His palm pressed against the rough bark of a nearby tree burned, brittle, and still radiating a faint, unnatural warmth.

He knew it wasn’t real. But it felt real. The bark, the heat and the texture of the ash like wood. His mind wandered briefly before the memory struck vivid, invasive, and not his own.

He was no longer himself. He was seated upon a throne within the desecrated Temple of the Twin Gods. The walls were dark with soot and shadowlight. Before him, Rakatan warriors marched into the sanctum, dragging limp Kiev’arian bodies by their wings and horns. Their armor had been shattered, their fires extinguished.

One by one, the Rakata carved open the fallen with brutish efficiency. From their chests, the Fire Tears were wrenched free each still pulsing dimly with the echo of the soul inside. They were offered as tribute.

And he, As Saurav’ix reached out with a blackened, clawed talon. Laphisto watched from behind his own eyes as that hand, his hand, took each Fire Tear in turn and consumed it. Power flooded through him with each soul, burning cold and pure. Pain twisted into strength. Grief became hunger. The god fed.

The memory fractured suddenly, as if torn by resistance. Laphisto snarled and shook his head, casting the weight of it off like a shroud. His eyes snapped open, and he found himself still in the false world the dystopian future conjured by the Archive’s illusion. The smoke was still there. The scorched trees. The haunting silence.

Only now, his vision had changed. He had seen what came before it. A faint red glow pulsed through his irises before slowly fading. He exhaled, the breath low and steady, and turned to Rellik.

“I couldn’t agree more, This is a future I’m glad is mere superstition.” But even as he spoke the words, he didn’t believe them. Not truly. Because what he’d just seen wasn’t imagined. It had happened.

Diarch Rellik

 

[Merion Oreno]

OBJECTIVE 2

Vytal Noctura Pel Grennin Briana Sal-Soren Tasia Palpatine Lily Decoria

Frustrating as the Jedi approach was, they didn't substantively get in the way, and Merion grudgingly admitted to himself that their meditations were helping. Most of his focus stayed where it needed to be: providing the great meld with good instincts fed by his equations. He was among the weakest in the Force present here, but the experience he brought was paying off. He hauled on the chain alongside the other haulers.

The next gear shifted into place with an earthquake clank. It tripped a cascade of clockwork. The ancient, arcane, desolate landscape shivered to life as far as the eye could see. Massive gears turned slowly but in synch.

The mechanism was repaired. Calladene functioned again.

Merion let go of the chain, hating this vast mechanism and those who'd made it.

He was sorely tempted, now that it was functional, to destroy it. He did not have the means and, in any case, destroying it could doom whole star systems. No, better to walk away. This thing had taken too much from everyone already. If the chance came to kill it with reasonable side effects, a year or a decade in the future, that was a problem for the future.

He thanked the witch for her conjuring and the inquisitor for his battle meditation and left.

 

[Vytal Noctura]

​

Vytal looked to Merion Oreno as the man seemed content with their work. She had been prepared to oppose him if he sought to destroy it. Not because the Great Machine deserved to exist, but because they could not any more carelessly destroy it as they could manipulate the gears senselessly. It should be unraveled from existence so recent event would never happen again; but such a thing would take time. Its gargantuan size alone would taken time to map its connection to this plane.

"Your assistance was most welcome, Navigator. Perhaps, someday, we may meet again." Whether they agreed philosophically or religiously hardly mattered. So long as people did not try to destroy Dathomir or harm those Vytal protected, any difference of creed could be overlooked. Only being Sith had a personal bias of distrust, but even that could be put aside with effort.

The Witch drifted back to the walkway and looked to Pel Grennin and Tasia Palpatine , with a look toward Briana Sal-Soren and Lily Decoria . Quite the curious amalgamation of people that worked together in this matter. A shame the accord would not last. Once a common foe was slain, people sought something to fill the void.

"Will you stay, or return?" the Nightmother asked of those still present. She would stay for a time. There was still much to learn. The spirits could aid her in its study, but even that would be just the beginning. It would not be surprising if the rest thought to leave now even further danger and destruction had been avoided.​

 

[Diarch Rellik]

It was the appearance of one Kie'varan launching at Diarch Rellik that made him move at first. A fierce warrior who attacked without fear. With the Spear already in his hand it was a natural instinct to block with it at first. With the Warden intertwined in Relliks spirit there was no ground given to the move. Swiping the weapon away - they moved with a quick volley of stabbing attacks to put the enemy on the back foot. A pause gave the Kie'varan a chance to attack that led to an overhead strike which was swirled around and faded gently through Relliks cloak, met with a twirl of the spear and a following stab that reached straight through the warrior. Pulling the weapon out the warrior faded to mist, leaving behind a pulsing, fading glowed stone.

Warden: "I can feel your disgust to kill one of our own. Do not fret, it is a mirage. Move forward."

The Warden was right and there was no time to waste. Looking back at Laphisto Rellik noticed he looked lost deeper into the vision than he and the Warden were.

Warden: "The soul of Saurav'ix lives within him."

The Diarch had practically forgot that fact. It must have been a damning site for his friend. Before he could reach out and try to shake him out of it Laphisto came to on his own.

"It seems there will be some fighting on our path. Myth or not. Are you feeling aware? Do not fret, I will have your back as well. I can focus more on defense."

Rellik looked away from the conversation out towards the visage of Saurav'ix's assault.

"If I had to guess, the door is behind the hardest part of the challenge. Now we just need to decipher if it is physical or mental achievement that we must conquer. - Knowing our luck, once we defeat everything in here; we will find a trap door that we could have gone through at the start."

Tags: Laphisto

 

[Isla Reingard]

Obj 1
​

Isla crouched behind the ruined bulk of a collapsed pillar, her breath loud in her ears, louder still against the dissonant silence that followed a Starweird's shriek. The sound didn't echo - didn't need to - it folded space and thought and stomachs in on themselves, left the air tasting like melted glass and forgotten names. She clutched a scorched metal rod like it meant something, like it could help. It couldn't. Not here.

"Phillip," she hissed under her breath, trying not to vomit or cry or do both at once. "This was so dumb."

Somewhere to her left, Phillip made a noise that might've been agreement or a small, dying animal. Hard to tell. Isla could see him trembling from across the fractured corridor - his silhouette thrown in three different directions by the prism walls, like the machine was trying to decide what version of him to keep.

She winced. She did drag him into this. Not because she wanted him to get hurt, but because he was too sweet not to say yes when she asked, and she'd seen it - seen it - the flash of Calladene waking in her dreams. The scream behind her own eyes. The Starweirds unfolding like silver flowers across dying stars.

"I thought I could help," she whispered. "I thought-"

Another gravitic pulse rolled through the conduit hall. Isla was lifted off her feet and deposited four meters away, cushioned only by pain and her own stunned disbelief. A vision rippled across the coolant pool beside her: a flickering Isla, older by years or minutes, jaw set, lightsaber crackling, kneeling over Phillip's body. Her hand twitched.

She turned away.

Whatever kind of hero she'd thought she was going to be when she stowed away on the Far Zenith, she wasn't it. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

But Calladene was screaming, and the Alpha was close. And Isla could still see. So she dragged herself upright, wiped blood and shimmer from her cheek, and started toward the next chamber - toward Phillip, toward the noise, toward the part where either she saved the Galaxy or it made a very poetic meal out of her.

Phillip Slate​