Chương 30: Chapter 27 : What The Hell...
Usually, walking the halls of the Academy by myself was dangerous at best, suicidal at worst. But today was a day for experimentation and opportunities and I had an hour until Overseer Ragate was expecting me.
Until now, my brief forays into the mental disciplines of the Force have been brutish, wielded with all the subtlety of a hammer to crush every thought but those that I wished. Well, all save for my first attempts at Beast Control. In fact, most of my abilities were blunt applications of the Force. I needed to expand my arsenal, so I decided to start small.
Mid-afternoon, the Academy halls were populated, but not packed. Acolytes were either returning from ventures into the Valley or heading back to their dorms from training or research in the archives for a rest before taking their evening meals.
Few, save for the various Lords and Overseers, were at their best, exhausted on some level, whether it be mentally or physically. At that point, they were vulnerable.
With the Sith not being picky about the age of their trainees, I did have to be careful when picking my targets, though that mainly boiled down to avoiding the ones carrying lightsabers and any Imperial Guardsmen that happened to be patrolling. I quickly spotted my first target.
The red eyes of a male Sith Pureblood lingered on me, sizing me up. He was tall and well-built with a training blade strapped to his back, every step measured and sure. His appearance was immaculate, save for a thin scar that stretched from the right side of his mouth to one of his chin tendrils. Likely a dueling scar.
I reached out to his mind, slipping a whisper into his thoughts, backed by just the barest hint of the Force. It was similar to my first beast, where I carefully shaped the cage around its thoughts. Only this time, I bound a leg with an invisible, weightless chain. My power snaked around his natural barriers, searching for a crack in the armor. When I found it, my influence flowed in like a mist, poisoning his thoughts.
He's beneath you. He's not worth the effort.
The red eyes slipped away, their owner's thoughts shifting to other matters.
I didn't let my expression change. I didn't have any guarantee that he wasn't already thinking that on his own. It was possibly a fluke.
But then, that's why you repeat the experiment. To see if the results are consistent.
The next was an Aqualish, her exposed skin covered in rough, jagged scars. She viewed everyone around her as a threat, her hands clenched unseen in the folds of her robes. I quietly moved closer, where it was all but assured that she would notice me. Before her attention turned to me, I whispered into her mind.
There's nobody there.
Her bulbous, black eyes swept over me without stopping. I passed by her without issue.
There are two variations of Force-based stealth. One was to bend the light to your will to render yourself truly invisible, though it was extremely energy intensive. The other was a variation of the Mind Trick. Instead of turning invisible, you simply convinced other people that you weren't there or that your presence was insignificant.
As I recall, Kreia was rather adept at the second one, using it to prevent Jedi Masters from realizing that she was present. She also used it to mess with the Disciple's head, which to be honest was the best use of the power. But she took it to the point of outright memory manipulation, which was well beyond my current abilities.
One by one, I poked and prodded, nudging their thoughts away from my presence. I didn't dare try it on anyone higher ranked than acolyte, but I would get there eventually, though that could be years away. For now, I could do it to a single target at a time.
Useful if I only wanted to avoid that person. But with practice and time, I could likely influence entire groups.
As I reached out for my twelfth test subject, the hairs on my neck stood up and a shiver went down my spine, despite Korriban's heat.
I was being watched.
I didn't spin around to try and find them. Instead, I took a deep breath to suppress the sudden surge of panic, then reached out with my senses, searching for someone that was paying a little too much attention.
It wasn't hard to find them, as they made little attempt to hide themselves. Despite that, their presence felt...muddled. They weren't hiding themselves, but they were hiding how much power they had.
I slowly turned to face them. In the hallway behind me, he stood in plain view.
He was human, at least in general shape. Yellow-orange eyes stared at me from a horrific face, which looked like it would split in half if his mouth opened too wide.
Claw and teeth marks and burns had transformed the flesh into a mass of scar tissue that only vaguely looked human. The sides of his head were either too scarred for hair to grow or he regularly shaved it.
Only a strip of gray hair running along the top of his head was left, pulled to the back into a ponytail that fell past his shoulders.
He stood with his arms crossed over his chest. Like the rest of the Sith, he was dressed all in black, though it was simple and practical in comparison to most of them. His sleeveless tunic exposed muscles that looked powerful enough to snap Gaarurra in half, skin nearly gray with scar tissue.
A gleaming lightsaber hung from his belt, in full view, though he made no move for it.
The space between us was clear of people, who flowed around us, seemingly unaware that they were doing such. Acolytes, soldiers, guardsmen, Lords…They all avoided meeting our eyes or even acknowledging our presences. This was…
He felt like a predator that was staring down a particularly amusing morsel.
He grinned, his scars turning it into a nightmarish expression.
I blinked.
Why was I standing here staring at an empty hallway?
...
With not much else to do, I made my way to Ragate's office, with five minutes to spare. Being late to a meeting with a Lady of the Sith, even if she was only an Overseer, was just not done if you valued your safety.
I pressed the door chime to announce my presence. The door hissed open a moment later, revealing a dark room.
"Crap," I muttered.
Nevertheless, I moved forward, though cautiously. My hand inched towards the sword at my belt.
"Overseer? You wished to see me?" I called.
The only warning I got was the sound of a lightsaber igniting before a bar of red swung towards my chest. Surging forward, I placed my left forearm in its path, hoping my enhancements worked. I was not looking forward to getting a cyberarm. When the plasma blade met the alchemical durasteel of my vambrace, it hissed and sparked.
Though it felt uncomfortably warm, it didn't penetrate the metal. I swept my arm over my head, taking the lightsaber with it.
Diving into a roll, I drew my sword from its sheathe in time to intercept the next strike. Like the vambrace, the blade hissed and sputtered, but held.
The glow of the lightsaber dimly illuminated its wielders face. The wrinkled elderly face of Ragate was split by a grin, a mad glint in her red eyes.
She quickly disengaged and extinguished her lightsaber just as the door slammed shut, leaving me in total darkness.
I shut my eyes and brought up my Force Sight. I was moving before the snap-hiss sounded off again, bringing my sword up in a diagonal slash. Her weapon deftly parried it, though I adjusted the grip and redirected the momentum to her other side. Again, she parried before disengaging.
This time, she disappeared even from my Force Sight.
"You have decent reflexes, enough to react to danger sufficiently," Ragate's voice echoed from everywhere, "Let's try another test…"
The crackle of lightning was a familiar sound by now, though far from a comforting one. While my mastery over it had grown recently, I still didn't have a hard counter for an opponent's lightning. I didn't dare move. I had no idea what the layout of the room was, so I risked tripping over something. My telekinetic barrier wasn't a sure defense, but it was the best I had.
Before I could choose, the blade in my hand rattled and surged upwards. Lightning struck it, briefly illuminating the room and blinding me both physically and in my Force Sight. But the shock didn't travel down to my hands and the flash of light left as quickly as it came.
"So dear Renning was correct," Ragate commented, sounding more amused than surprised, "You did manage to accidentally create a true Sith Sword. My oh my."
I blinked rapidly as the lights turned on, dispelling my Force Sight.
"Come child, let me get a good look at you."
Suddenly, Ragate was uncomfortably close, sidestepping the sword that just ate goddamn lightning. Her left hand grabbed a hold of my chin, turning my head one way and the other. The other held her deactivated lightsaber.
"Ah, Korriban has already left its marks on you," She chuckled to herself, pausing to run a thumb along my cybernetics, "As have several Masters. You have broken several chains, yet more remain."
I couldn't really reply, mostly because I was still stunned and trying to figure out what the hell was going on.
Finally, she released my face, though I still didn't dare move.
"But where are my manners?" The Overseer tutted and gestured towards a chair, "Come, sit. Would you like some tea, dear?"
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