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September 17 - September 20, 2020
Denying or attempting to utterly control emotion, Revan felt, was a fool’s game. Jealousy was actually the result of ill-prepared Jedi being overwhelmed by feelings they had never learned to face. Revan believed Jedi could be taught to use positive emotions like love and happiness to strengthen their connection to the Force in the same way that hatred and anger gave power to those who followed the dark side.
he emerged from his solitude to call a great council of all the Sith Lords who remained.
He invited them to participate in a ritual to unlock the full potential of the dark side; he promised they would unleash power beyond anything they had ever witnessed or imagined.”
“Some refused to answer his call. But many more came. After all, what could one man do against a hundred Sith Lords?
“Once they arrived on Nathema, they quickly fell under Lord Vitiate’s control. He dominated their minds, crushed their resistance. He turned them into slaves to his will, forcing them to participate in the most complex ritual of Sith sorcery ever attempted. Calling on the dark side, Lord Vitiate devoured them. He fed on their power, absorbing it into himself, utterly obliterating all traces of his victims.
“But the ritual was not confined to the doomed Sith Lords. They were but the eye of the storm; the center of a vortex that spread across the entire planet. Every man, woman, and child on Nathema died that day. Every beast, bird, and fish; all the insects and plants; every living being touched by the Force was consumed. When the ritual ended, Nathema was no longer a world. It was a husk sucked dry. Lord Vitiate sacrificed millions, stealing their life force to make himself immortal. Their deaths also made him stronger than any Sith who had come before, and he ceased to be known as Lord Vitiate.
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There wasn’t even any wind, and the air tasted stale in Scourge’s mouth. The temperature was neither cold nor hot, but he felt himself starting to shiver. “You feel the chill of the Void,” Nyriss told him. “The Force is energy; it gives heat to our emotions and our minds. But here it has been stripped away.”
everything around them was either brown or gray, as if the colors had been leached out.
what had happened on Nathema was different, and it disturbed him in a deep and profound way. The Emperor had consumed everything. Life, sound, color, even the Force—nothing remained. This wasn’t about conquest or domination or destroying an enemy—all concepts Scourge embraced. Everything on Nathema had simply been snuffed out, extinguished so completely that it ceased to have any meaning or purpose. It was a vacuum of existence; a blight on the natural order.
Destroying your enemies—even destroying a planet—was understandable. But this wasn’t simple destruction. It was annihilation; obliteration. The very fabric of the Force had been shredded. Anyone capable of turning an entire planet into a nihilistic abomination had to be completely mad.
She could feel the Void pressing in on her from all sides. At the same time it was pulling on her, trying to rip away the very essence of her existence. Nature abhors a vacuum; the emptiness was trying to fill itself with her energy. For an instant she felt as if she were going to become undone, her physical body discorporating into trillions of subatomic particles that would scatter across the entire surface of Nathema. No! she screamed in her mind. The Void will not take me! I am more than just a collection of random matter and particles! I am a living being. I am Meetra Surik! The
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Once she was in motion she felt better, but she could still sense the Void hovering on the fringes of her awareness. It was like being stalked by some nameless, faceless, invisible creature. She felt it lurking around every corner, just waiting for her to let her guard down so it could take her.
The Emperor was clad in unadorned black robes, the raised hood effectively hiding his face. Yet Scourge could feel the power of the dark side emanating from him with such intensity that it caused a faint rippling of the air.
The Emperor had thrown back his hood to reveal his face; his eyes were as black as the Void itself.
There was something strange about the Emperor’s voice. It didn’t sound like the voice of a single being. It had an unusual echo and resonance, almost as if a great multitude were speaking his words in perfect symphony.
A grim theory passed unbidden through Scourge’s mind: was it possible all those that had been consumed by the ritual on Nathema still existed in some form within the Emperor himself? Nyriss said he’d devoured them, but what if she was only partially correct? What if he had imprisoned their spirits inside his own corporeal form, slowly feeding on their life energy over a thousand years to keep himself young and strong?
The Emperor was no longer a member of the Sith species; his power and immortality had transformed him into a being unique in the galaxy. When he spoke of life and death, it had far deeper meaning than the mere physical existence of the lesser beings that served him.
As he spoke, the dark circles of his eyes seemed to fill with a swirling red mist, and for a brief instant the Emperor gave Scourge a glimpse of his true self. Scourge cried out in anguish as the Emperor’s mind brushed against his, then he collapsed to the floor, shaking like a child. The touch lasted less than a second, but in that time he witnessed indescribable horrors that dwarfed anything the dark side could conjure even in his worst nightmares. And beneath the formless terrors lurked the unbearable Void, the pure emptiness of total annihilation.
The air around her began to crackle and grow hot as she gathered herself for the killing blow. Scourge felt the energy building inside her, and he knew he would be powerless to stop it. Nyriss was too powerful; her command of the dark side was too strong. “Gaze upon me and see your doom!” she declared. “I am Darth Nyriss, Lord of the Sith. I am the conqueror of Drezzi, the destroyer of Melldia, and a member of the Dark Council!”
A dozen bolts of lightning sprang from Nyriss’s hand, arcing across the room to incinerate her enemies. Instead of leaping back into the cell to avoid the deadly attack, Revan stepped forward to intercept it. Both hands were held in front of him, his arms fully extended at shoulder height, his thumbs touching and his fingers splayed wide. He drew the bolts of lightning into his waiting grasp, channeling them away from their intended targets and absorbing their power. “I am Revan reborn,” he said to Nyriss. “And before me you are nothing.” Nyriss’s eyes went wide as Revan unleashed the power of
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He has become obsessed with power and immortality. The dark side is like a cancer inside him; it grows faster than he can feed it. He has consumed an entire world, but he still hungers. And with his hunger comes an all-consuming fear. He has lived a thousand years; he knows he could live many thousands more. He is terrified of death.”
“Nathema was just the beginning,” Scourge agreed. “He will destroy world after world, his power and madness growing in concert until he alone is left, Emperor over an empty and lifeless galaxy.”
the ritual on Nathema took days, if not weeks. And the Emperor had to trick hundreds of other powerful Sith into working with him so he could draw on their power.”
“This time I know his tricks and tactics,” Revan assured them. “I can shield my mind from being dominated by his will, and I can show you how to do the same.”
“Once you had the vision of Meetra, were you certain she was coming? Did you know for sure that she would help free you?” Revan shook his head. “We can never be certain about anything. The future is always in motion, and a vision shows you only one of many possible outcomes.”
“So the visions are not absolute?” “As I said, the future is always in motion.”
“Are you hoping he will finish what you might not?” “Him or someone else,” Revan admitted. “The Force always strives for balance. The Emperor is an agent of darkness and destruction. It is inevitable that a champion of the light will one day rise to oppose him. I may be that champion.”
He understood that the two sides of the Force were more closely intertwined with each other than either the Jedi or the Sith would ever admit. He had learned to balance on the knife-edge between them, drawing on both the light and dark sides for strength.
Revan’s thoughts drifted back to his last confrontation with the Emperor. In all his battles, he had never faced an enemy with that kind of power. The dark side had radiated from him in palpable waves, his physical shell barely able to contain the crackling energy.
In their last meeting he had overwhelmed Revan completely; it wasn’t even fair to call it a battle.
Revan landed on the ground and wheeled around to face the other man. He thrust out with the Force, the impact hitting the soldier square in the chest. Instead of sending him flying, it only staggered him back half a step—this close to the Emperor they were sworn to protect, the guards were able to draw on his power to protect themselves.
Revan began to sense the oppressive presence of the dark side weighing down on him. The Emperor was trying to crush his will: to dominate and enslave his mind as he had before. This time, however, Revan was ready. Instead of charging forward, he opened himself up to the Force, letting both the light and the dark side flow through him like twin rushing rivers. But instead of focusing or channeling the Force, he released it in its purest form.
There was brilliant flash as the air between the two combatants lit up. The energy unleashed was powerful enough to send Revan staggering. The Emperor, unprepared and with much of his strength diverted to his effort to dominate Revan’s mind, was sent flying backward.
A dozen bolts of purple lightning arced from the Emperor toward him. Revan tried to draw them in and contain them, but the Emperor was infinitely more powerful than Darth Nyriss had ever been.
When he absorbed Nyriss' bolts with ease, he had said that before him, she was nothing.
As a reward Scourge was to become his personal enforcer and executioner, taking his orders directly from the Emperor and answering to no one but him. That wasn’t the full extent of his reward, however. For his role in exposing Xedrix, Nyriss, and Revan, the Emperor had promised to grant Scourge the gift of eternal life. He would forever serve at the Emperor’s side,
“The ritual cannot be undone,” the Emperor said as Scourge writhed and wept at his feet. Through his torment, Scourge realized with dawning horror what the Emperor was saying. The ritual was over, but the searing heat and the rending of his insides continued unabated.
every movement seemed to amplify the pain. Trembling, he rose to his feet and addressed the Emperor. “How long will this anguish last?” he asked, his jaw clenched. “As time passes you will learn to accept and endure your suffering,” the Emperor answered. “Your mind and body will find ways to deal with the pain. After many months you will become accustomed enough to it to function in your role as the Emperor’s Wrath. Eventually you will simply become numb, unable to feel anything at all.” “Why?” Scourge asked, his voice something between a sob and a moan. “Everything has a cost,” the Emperor
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REVAN’S CELL WAS AS MUCH LABORATORY AS PRISON. Trapped in a suspended cage of shimmering power, he hovered somewhere between life and death. His paralyzed body was in some kind of stasis, preserved and protected so that even time itself could not touch him. But his consciousness was fully aware.
Meetra could sense his suffering. When she had died, she had not become one with the Force. Loyal to the end, her spirit had remained with Revan, an invisib...
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As the Emperor fed off him, Meetra was allowing Revan to feed off her.
