บท 99: V.1-C.99│Passage III│

Another year had passed and it was quite boring but Anakin had officially become 18 years of age. Well, not like that mattered all to much because he had already reached his peak physical age a long time ago.

His abilities and powers had come to a still and it looks like it would take even more time for him to build himself up.

If he was to continuing drain the Force out of people or object with Force energy it could lead to him gaining too much power, too fast. It is sometimes better to slow oneself down and take your time.

Within his secret Order, he had a few members and the current person he had placed in charge was Zannah as she had nothing else better to do. While he didn't want her corrupting those already within, that didn't mean he was going to keep them from the dark side.

Rynalla, Lorana and Alysun all were learning from her, of course he gave Zannah a revised version of her code. He gave his own that they would all come to know of and accept within his Order, and they were developing quite nicely.

Even Zannah herself was improving within the Force because once you have hit rock bottom, the only thing left for you to go is up.

Fortunately even after a year, she had not left and seemed quite reluctant to leave as well. If only he could know why...

Of course he knows why, its because she has started to develop proper feelings for him and she hasn't been fully corrupted by the dark side but there was a problem though. Even though she was developing these feelings she was becoming possessive and in fact had started to be somewhat cruel to Rynalla who was also similar to her.

Rynalla and Zannah were quite similar in nature, especially when it came to how the dark side influenced their emotions, not that they weren't in control but because they saw each other as enemies. Romantic rivals if you will, even though Zannah technically held the upper hand above her because of the Dyad with him.

Thankfully it didn't seem to interfere much, if at all with the learning process and she had adhered to what he wanted. Whatever they do with their personal time is none of his business, maybe a little but still...

If Anakin wanted to get any stronger he would have to start feeding on those with very strong connection to the Force. Whether this people, objects, planets or an environment.

In fact he was considering absorbing the vergence underneath the Coruscant Jedi temple, as this would give the Jedi a heads up but it would go against what the Force wanted. Anakin had already set up plans to slowly siphon those within the temple to become apart of his own order so it would be best to go with this plan.

Trying to change it up so late in the game could make something go wrong, his carefully placed pawns could be found and destroyed. It wasn't only the Sith, meaning Palpatine that he was cautious of, it was also the Jedi.

What would their reaction be to him leaving and creating an Order of his own? Would they deem him just as dangerous as the Sith and try to take him down? He doubts it but it certainly wouldn't be a favorable relationship.

[]

On Coruscant, underneath the Jedi temple.

It had taken a year, but it was well worth it. Anakin believed it was time to show Shaak some more of his secrets and reveal to her some more things and he had also decided to bring Ahsoka in on what everyone else knew.

It would be unfair to the girl given by how much she is attached to him and may even feel like a betrayal because he didn't trust her with this.

Anakin knew of Ahsoka's circumstances and why exactly she had come to like him so quickly, and he wasn't worried about her revealing anything thinking she had enough maturity and control over herself and her mind.

Now that he had the four closest people within the Jedi exposed to some of his secrets he had decided to try and start convincing them of what he was planning. What he wanted to do and his future plans giving them the opportunity to not participate in anything he was going to do.

It was incredibly unlikely that they would reject what he wanted.

Even Ahsoka who wasn't even connected to him through a Dyad would leave the Jedi in a heartbeat to stay with him, but not only with, the other girls as well. They had become sort of a family of sorts.

Of course a very weird family of sorts but a family nonetheless.

Having brought everyone down to the his base underneath the Jedi temple, Anakin started to talk about things. He was going to leave out some details and edit the truth of the matter somewhat but he decided that it would be better if they knew about what he was doing.

Their mental defenses have grown because of his instruction not taking into account their connection to him making himself and them stronger and with every person connected to him he gets stronger which creates a chain reaction with the others as well.

The Dyad even though had some severe consequences if someone within the bond were to die and alot of benefits that in general outweighed those disadvantages.

Anakin talked about how he was going to leave the Order in the future, to the modification done to his body and he even went on to explain that he had gained immortality. This was the reason he had gone off the grid so to speak and why they couldn't feel him because of this process.

They all got mad, even Ahsoka who was just brought into the fold because who would want their loved one to go through a process that could kill them.

Even more so they didn't want to lose him now, especially Aayla who was the only one to have officially started a secret relationship with him.

Of course those within the group had finally figured out that they were together and some jealously was of course present but what could they do when it is meant to be this way. Or at least it was decided to be this way according to the will of the Force.

Not that they didn't all feel some type of way about Anakin, excluding Ahsoka who was still a child, thirteen but still too young for stuff like that.

This prompted Barriss and Shaak to start going out with him more and more because they too wanted to advance their relationship with him even if they were too shy about it. Anakin had some struggle trying to juggle being a Jedi, hiding his developing relationships with the girls from most of everyone and further building up his empire.

That was another thing to talk about, the progress and his role within the Empyrean.

Soon Anakin would leave the Order, and in fact he was planning to do so and try and convince both Qui-Gon and Mace to follow him. They would probably both not accept. He even wanted to try and get Obi-Wan to follow him as well but Obi-Wan is worse than Qui-Gon when it came to traditions, so that would probably be a no go if even Qui-Gon wouldn't accept.

What Anakin was interested in though was his eventually meet up with Padme, he had not seen her and she had not seen him but he has a sneaking suspicion she has been keeping tabs on him.

It wouldn't surprise him but it would certainly be a little weird.

Maybe it was the way of the Force trying to get them to pair up together again, like the original, the thing is Anakin doesn't plant to stay with the Jedi and in fact would be in an even better position to get closer to her after the fact.

[]

The Empyrean, while has grown two be in control of two star systems it wasn't enough for Anakin.

On Tatooine the population had increased but so had it increased on Andooweel meaning that he may sooner or later want to start looking to expansion. The will of the people is a powerful thing and it would seem their loyalty to the empire was incredibly strong.

This only meant Anakin had been able to keep up with the demand and supply of the economy, the political situation where those who would seek some sort of reforms were also not present. His military and intelligence departments had grown as well.

While droids made up a good part of his standing armies that didn't mean they were the best even when he tried to make them the best.

Andooweel handling his food and water resources was going good. Tatooine handling his technology and energy production is going good as well and when thinking about everything he would need more materials.

The metals industry was lacking and while there was alot of deposits on Tatooine, they wouldn't be enough to keep up with the expansion.

The health industry would be booming soon because Anakin had successful come up with a version of the bio-engineered 24th chromosome and had been experimenting with creating other version for other species.

Of course this 24th chromosome was only to be used on Humans and Near-Humans because its specifically for them but other species that have a different genetic makeup and chromosome count would need modification.

The point of this serum was meant to make the best of your parts. Anakin had seen this with himself because even though he would be unique in the fact that there would be no one else with the same genetic structure and modifications because that was just how it would be, it didn't mean others would be unable to benefit somewhat.

His citizens would become smarter, stronger, faster, and whatever else was important to their quality of life. They would not get sick as often, if at all meaning that within the health industry all you would need to take is this serum.

Anakin knew that people would want to try and discover the secrets behind this, that is why he would be using Sith alchemy to make sure people are unable to figure out the process.

It may have been dangerous to do so if he wasn't knowledgeable but he was and he had a thorough and in-depth power within the Force allowing him a wide degree of error. There wouldn't be any error however because there was none.

What was interesting however was where he would strike next.

Being right next to Geonosis, Tatooine was in a prime position to attack but obviously his mother and himself will reject any request sent by the Republic or the Jedi.

Looking back on his options to expand the amount of space he can gain control over, there was something new that had popped up.

Kemal Station.

Kemal Station served as an informal borderline between the Regency Worlds, which were primarily connected economically to commerce along the Corellian Run hyperlane, and the worlds that were located spinward along the Triellus Trade Route and whose economies were dominated by members of the Hutt species.

As a result, Kemal Station serviced both legitimate merchants and smugglers. During the Galactic Civil War, the wealthy entrepreneur Meysen Kayson owned several properties on the moon.

Now Anakin would be the one to own this moon, because how could he not take advantage of such a lucrative trade route. He was already starting to build up his own space within the galaxy and start his expansion even further out from his starting point of Tatooine.

'Owning hyperspace lanes is great.' Anakin thought to himself about the value of these small trade routes because they helped to increase the value of his Empires currency system. It had been going incredibly well which helped to further elevate the peoples financial situation.

Unfortunately Geonosis does get in his way to other areas where he would have to go the long way around to conquer.

Anakin decided that he would just take control over the star systems still connected to the trade routes leading into Tatooine, this way he would have good buffer between his current capital and the other worlds in case of people coming to knock on his door.

Geonosis would have to stay off limits for now though.

Even more annoying however was that Geonosis had taken into their coalition star systems he may have wanted to slowly work his way towards himself.

He would take Kemal Station, to increase his ability to trade, Ooo-temiuk for its special ability to plant and grow special trees which would help contribute to his developing construction based economy. The star system of Utaruun would become his secondary agriculture based world and would help him produce in mass more food.

This would then help him save and increase capital and value. It would also create more jobs for the people as well, meaning more production and development as well.

As long as Anakin plays his cards right he would be able to continue this stability.

The Obana system was just an asteroid belt and had no proper uses to him other than becoming an outpost with which he could station and train up his secret intelligence. Deploying and creating many bases around this asteroid belt while storing some ships here would be great.

He could create a military based academy here in the future but for now his intelligence could station on and around the asteroid belt.

Going past the asteroid belt however are is open space before coming across a star system that would allow Anakin to open up even more of the hyperspace lanes to his control. Because it wouldn't take long to take over Obana and considering there was nothing of great importance there Anakin could skip over to the next star system.

Vor Deo.

Vor Deo was a terrestrial planet located in the Vor Deo system, a part of the Arkanis sector in the Slice portion of the Outer Rim Territories. Vor Deo was located on the Old Corellian Run hyperlane and on the tip of the Cranan-Excarga Route.

This would connect his Empyrean to other trade routes allowing even better control of the space surrounding Tatooine, the current seat of his power. Overall, it is a good decision to just gobble all of this up because there is enough resources and military might to hold onto these places.

[]

There is unrest in the Galactic Senate. Several thousand solar systems have declared their intentions to leave the Republic.

This separatist movement, under the leadership of the mysterious Count Dooku, has made it difficult for the limited number of Jedi Knights to maintain peace and order in the galaxy.

Senator Amidala, the former Queen of Naboo, is returning to the Galactic Senate to vote on the critical issue of creating an ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC to assist the overwhelmed Jedi....