Darth Hervor, Dark Lord of the Sith

[Apillis]

"If you are falling... dive." ~ Joseph Campbell

Name: Hervor (aka Allvitende, the Strange Creature, the Archivist)
Race: Laitra (Custom Race)
Age: 323
Birth place: Grautus ((custom city))

Allegiance: Sith Order
Status: Dark Lord of the Sith, Sith Archivist
Rank: Master - Marauder

Height: 5’10”
Weight: 135 lbs.
Appearance: Like many Laitra her hair is a scarlet hue, which she keeps somewhat parted (or slicked back) in a short, asymmetrical hairstyle. But from the great corruption of the dark side within her, her complexion has become the pallor more akin to that of corpse than anything else. Small spider-crack veins fan out from the corners of her eyes, while dark rings encase what once were lovely piercing baby blues, though have long turned into a yellow orange blazing faint glowing hue and even darkened the very whites of her eyes to black by the evil that has gripped her so profoundly. She has a bit of a stature to her, even a little lanky, though with an athletes physique that is quite lean and tone, while her calloused hands are a bit spidery do to her slender fingers.

Evidence of her attractiveness is still there, more so if one can look beyond the corruption of the dark side that has marked her so thoroughly over the years, after all, as a Laitra she has reached the years where she is in her prime. Albeit, a mark on her corrupted visage in the form of a scar reaching from her just in front of her left ear runs across her left cheek only to stop at the left side of the bridge of her narrow nose. But it is not the only scar from battle that marks her body as she has gained many.

She wears black very light armored weave military-style leggings one would expect an infantryman to wear, while the boots she wears are the traditional brown leather boots one would expect to see upon a Jedi's feet. On her chest she wears a simple black halter top. Though a somewhat strange choice of garb she is always seen wearing is a cloak commonly wore by Jedi Archivists, though hers is worn and blood stained from having been wore into many battles in the past; and she wears her Jedi utility belt over it around her slim waist. It is not unsurprising to see her with the hood drawn of her cloak, shielding her visage from the sight of others, especially as she often secludes herself to the solitary of the dark recesses of the archives within the Sith Academy. At times she is also known to wear a black mask with monstrous grey jagged fangs, that covers the lower half of her face.

((Take no credit for painted photo pic above. Texturing for other pics by Psychos1s. Click on bottom pic for two additional images. The likeness being an overall appearance of Hervor without her mask and Jedi Archivist robe, for a more detailed account of her appearance, naturally read the appearance section of the app.))

Personality: In the calmer moments, she is a severe personality, even as a Jedi she was known for being an intense individual. Like that of a scholar who has seen a bit too much of the darker aspects of what they have sought to learn in their expeditions for greater knowledge and deeper understanding. But as she has gotten older, that intensity has been honed with a certain temperance, that is to say it has not been lessened, but rather received a direction and purpose. She is a direct, thoughtful, even a bit engimatic and the strength that lies within such a person is only exclaimed within her voice with each spoken word. But, again, these are within the more subdued moments, the calm before the storm as it were...

Outside of those placid times, she can be discribed as nothing shy of a monster--fulfilling almost any understanding of the word and concept. Rage and hate consume her beyond just giving into passions, but rather the quintessential vision of wrath and vengeance. Opposition is her philosophy and creed, and it is has shaped her into a being that within a blink of an eye can become a figure of ire and madness in its entirety. It is who she is, it is what she is--to oppose is what she seeks with the Jedi, and to oppose is what she channels all of her strength within from the darkness around her--fueling her to continuously wage her jihad against the Jedi.

It is not simply death she wants nor seeks, but pain, she wants to know that the victims of her fury know pain as she does, to know loss and the vaccuum within the soul wrought from when part of ones heart has been torn from them. What she wants is for her victims to know agony, for every time they close their eyes, every time they look in a mirror, for every time they think of their loved ones, for every time they even gaze upon their own hands, they see her and are reminded of the pain she forced them to suffer. As she stands in opposition to everything they seek to enrich themselves, for everything they seek to build, she will seek to oppose it and leave it in a ruin at their feet. Causing their inner-turmoil to break them as her own has broken her.

She is that which opposes...

Birth place: Grautus ((custom city))

Ships/Vehicles:

Equipment:
Lightsaber: Tyrfing - A lightsaber that looks like it was assembled from a standard lightsaber duelist's hilt and that of an old worn electrum lightsaber hilt of an honored Jedi Master, and the two blended together into one hilt--as if one was used to supplement parts to repair the other; though it is difficult to tell which was utilized to repair the other. When ignited the blade is an intense fiery orange hue.

Stats:

Strength - Below Average
Agility - Superior
Intelligence - Above Average
Charisma - Above Average

Force Stats:

Telekinetic- Apprentice
Telepathic- Apprentice
Body- Master
Sense- Adept
Protection- Novice
Healing– Unskilled
Destruction– Master

Combat Training:
Mixed Martial Arts (including Broken Gate) - Expert
Small Arms (Firearms) - Novice

Force Training:
Death Field - Expert
Force Body - Master
Force Storm - Expert

Other Training:
Piloting - Apprentice
Galactic Lore - Adept
Force Lore - Expert
Military History - Adept
Archiving - Expert

Lightsaber Training:

Shii-Cho- Master
Makashi- Untrained
Soresu- Untrained
Ataru- Master
Djem So- Master
Niman- Untrained
Juyo- Master
Double Bladed Combat- Untrained


Bio:

"My anger has meant pain to me but it has also meant survival, and before I give it up I'm going to be sure that there is something at least as powerful to replace it on the road to clarity." ~ Audre Lorde

The Hervor Crisis

Within the Jedi Archives of the Jedi Temple of Coruscant the holocrons serve many purposes, teaching lightsaber forms, charting the stars, the accounts of a lifetime's worth of knowledge from masters now long past on preserving their knowledge for future generations, and some are simply cautionary tales for future generations of Jedi to learn from. The purpose of holocrons is many and the Jedi's use of them is equally as varied. But there is one within the Jedi Archives that is a combination of a cautionary tale and the collective knowledge of a disgraced retired Grandmaster of the Order from well-over two centuries ago. It was labelled "The Hervor Crisis". A couple ago it was viewed often by Knights and Masters alike. After all, it involved a fallen Jedi that fought the Mandalorians during their rise 50 years ago, whose name was Hervor.

In the mind of the holocron's creator, his collected knowledge of a three centuries of living as a Jedi, and his tutelage of Hervor were not mutually exclusive, but it in time had been expanded upon by other authors with information on Hervor alone. It was understood that Hervor would be his only pupil given the immense length of their lifespans, especially Hervor's, and all that he had left to teach would be left to her. He was a Morellian and she was a Laitra, even in the Unknown Regions of space where their scattered cities lie, to come across a Laitra outside of their cities is a rare thing. Then again not many even realize they may have encountered one as they look essentially like human females or at least near-human. Hervor's master, the former Grandmaster of the Order, Hjomalir, or simply 'Master Hjo' for short--was an old Morellian, even to their standards. Morellians in their prime are generally just over a century old, and those in their retiring years range between their 160s to 180s, and pass on in their lower to mid 2nd century of living. Master Hjo was over three centuries old by the time of his passing. He was barely over a century when he took Hervor as his padawan.

Hervor these days is likely in her prime, being just over three centuries old herself--at the peak of her power, where a few centuries worth of study and learning of the Force and two centuries worth of harnessing and training to utilize the power of the dark side to its fullest, has all begun to click into place. While for some given what she has become, it maybe difficult to recall or understand she was once anything other than her current countenance. After all, at one time she was someone's little girl, a cherished and beloved daughter that a young Laitra raised as her own for a brief time.

She was born within the city of Grautus, a Laitra city dedicated to warfare... somewhat fitting many say given what she later became. The Laitra couple she was born to were nomadic, which is fairly unique for Laitra--who tend to often be more stationary with where they reside. But one of the two chose to move on, leaving the infant Hervor with her partner. As it turned she was not possess as much wanderlust as her companion did, choosing to return to Laitra space. The galaxy was a far less safe place at the time on top of which, as the galaxy was still trying to recover from the Great Sith War. But Hervor remained in the care for the young Laitra for a couple more decades as they remained far from the galactic affairs and warring that proceeded the Great Sith War, such as the Mandalorian Wars, the Jedi Civil War, and the Dark Wars. The were incredibly dangerous times, especially for Force-sensitives whom the Sith in those days targeted outright.

Though, adding to the oddity, the young Laitra gave Hervor away, and not just to anyone of course, but to the Jedi, the reasoning for this is exceptionally peculiar. But in the Laitra stated her reasoning was simply she felt she could not care for the little one any longer, and given the climate of Laitra society, giving Hervor away to one of them, she may unwittingly be giving the girl to an enemy. And with the Sith defeated by the Jedi, and the Jedi once more within a reconstruction phase of their history, the young Laitra figured they were the next best solution for the little one to be trained and be strong in the Force. While scarcely even a toddler at the time, the Jedi despite their desperation to refill their ranks were wisely hesitant to bring in a Laitra into the fold. Their had only been one other Laitra to have been trained as a Jedi before Hervor, and she had fallen to the dark side and the Laitra the Jedi have known to be a volatile species by nature with a poor history with the Jedi. Rising above ones nature is what Jedi train to do, and so in spite of their hesitations, Hervor wound up being accepted into the newly reforming of the Jedi Order.

As for the young Laitra who brought her to the Jedi Order--well, that is another story...

In Hervor's early years as a youngling, much of her time was spent being little more than a precocious little girl running about the Jedi Temple halls, frivolous and carefree--as any child should be. Though she had a habit of leaving little data-recordings about the temple for others to see, she had yet to learn how to create holocrons naturally do to her still being a little child; but the recordings were simply of her enthusiastically explaining what she learned in her classes and/or what she discovered in her little 'adventures' frolicking about the temple halls. Some found it quite endearing, others did not care for it thinking she should be taught to be a little more subdued and disciplined.

As a student though she was marked for being quite sharp and observant with an immense eagerness to learn. While most of the academic students preferred the study of direct wielding of the Force and mental arts, Hervor while easily viewed as being one of the more 'bookwormy' sorts, somewhat uniquely preferred more athletic pursuits and studying lightsaber forms and philosophies over direct manipulation of Force energies. It made her stand out a little more among her academic peers. What she wanted to do and was starting to train and study to become was a Jedi Archivist, learning the ancient lore of the Force and the Jedi. For the young little bookworm, the thought was thrilling to her, and that ambition remained with her for her entire Jedi career for the most part.

As she got a little older, old enough to be chosen by a Knight or Master to be their Padawan, she held the interest of the former Grandmaster of the Order who had recently retired his position only a couple years prior to choosing Hervor as his pupil--she was over forty years old at the time--basically a preteen to Laitra, but in any case his name was Master Hjo. He was a strange one, thought of leaving a legacy within the Order more than a Jedi usually does or perhaps even should. He was grandmaster at one hundred-thirty, retired the position at one hundred-fifty. It is difficult not to have a passing thought or two about what one is going to leave behind even within any other day regardless of circumstance.

As mentioned, Laitra are rare finds not just within the Order but in general outside of Laitra space, thus he thought it fitting for his remaining teachings and knowledge to be passed on to a pupil who while still young relative to their species could learn all he had to trach. Besides, who better to train a Laitra padawan with their extreme longevity than a Morellian Jedi Master--once Grandmaster of the Order?

The old Morellian was known for being a powerful Jedi in every manner of the definition (one does not become Grandmaster of the Order otherwise), but he was quite well-known for being a lightsaber duelist. Albeit, Hervor's tutelage was not at Master Hjo's alone, he was a firm believer in where he lacked in being able to teach a pupil, another master teaching the pupil is the only other prudent course. Thus in the course of Hervor's young life she has studied under numerous masters other than Master Hjo alone. Some of which she studied under for years, even a couple decades. Albeit, much of that training with other masters surrounded honing her lightsaber abilities themselves, and her sharpening her physical conditioning accompanied by enhancing her physicality through the Force; which would often come full circle back to Master Hjo's teachings.

Understand, she is a Laitra, she ages much slower than what is consider to be the norm like with humans, rodians, or twi'leks, etc. Even while she was a mere young girl not even having reached her kind's age of adolescence, she had lived as long as many human Jedi Knights--even Masters, and by the time she reached her adolescence she had lived as longer than many of the veteran Knights and Masters. From a certain perspective this gave her an advantage in her development than her human or other near-human counterparts who typically can only expect to live a century, if even that. This enabled her to have more time to comprehend and ruminate on the information taught to her. Albeit, the drawback her development in her strength in the Force and even simple physicality was much slower than her human and most other near-human peers.

Even by the time she constructed her lightsaber, a single-phased standard hilt orange beamed lighsaber--she was already well into her sixth decade of living. Many of those she remembered seeing as toddlers over the years she saw ten years later being taken by their master to go to Ilum or Dantoonie, where within the crystal caves they would construct their own lightsabers. As a Laitra, adolescence and the maturity to construct a lightsaber came much slower to Hervor than most other species.

Though, it would be lie to say she was not gitty the day came when Master Hjo took Hervor to the wondrous crystal caves of Ilum, and she found a crystal that she drawn to most. An orange crystal, which is a unique find at Ilum since the crystals that grow there tend to be of the common blue and green variety. She spent weeks meditating upon that crystal, making it her own before diligently constructing her lightsaber.

According to Master Hjo it was an interesting sight to see Hervor obtaining her crystal. Among all the clusters of varying crystals, she simply walked passed them all as if they never existed. From her peripheral she saw the orange crystal. She said she was attracted to it because the sight of it felt like standing before a great star she had seen as if in a dream, as if the sun refused to rise or refused to set--remaining obstinate in its position--burning that which did not respect its strength.

It was not off-base to say that she held resentment toward those aging so much quicker than her, while she trained diligently for years--decades as a Padawan, she watched those she was a youngling with, even tutored as an expertienced Padawan, surpass her in station within the Jedi Order, while with Knights she was often well-over twice their age. For an adolescent such a thing was difficult, and despite these frustrations she harbored, Master Hjo's words of assurance that her time will come, failed to soothe her aggravations. He knew that when she gets older and wiser, she will understand it is nothing to trouble herself over. But, that is often the way of things, the words of wisdom and teachings one is given and failed to learn as an adolescent wind up only being understood when they are no longer needed. The sign one has grown up.

Irregardless of Master Hjo's counsel to her, a certain level of resentment of the 'older' Jedi always lingered during her Padawan years. Because the reality is she knew many of the Masters and the more veteran Knights for quite some time, not only has she known them literally all of their lives but even had a hand in tutoring some of them at varying points. She longed to meet their condescension toward her with an exclamation of when they were young, she was teaching them. Her choking down her anger and holding back a curled lip of irritation every time she was talked down to was difficult; and all do to being what is her peoples youth and not being regarded for the fact she has been studying and training for as long as them--longer in numerous cases, all that separated them was biology and rank.

But, outside of these moments of frustration, she proved to be an exceedingly attentive student and eager to learn what she could with an intensity that would define her for much of her life. And with Master Hjo's concern for leaving behind as much of his accumulated knowledge as he could with his pupil, there was much he was willing to share with her. This left open numerous debates among other Masters, for much of the things he was instructing her was in was some things a wizened Master typically would only share with Knights or other Masters. They were teachings on how to hone aggression, and some believe those teachings may have fostered the resentments she bore toward the Knights and Masters younger than herself. Her knowledge was as advanced as theirs in some regards, but again--what she lacked in comparison to them was her biology was still that of an adolescent girl and naturally her power and ability itself had yet to come into its own.

Master Hjo's teachings he often labelled as 'passive-aggression', but not in the usual connotation that is applied to the term. In Master Hjo's teachings: one must go with the flow of everything, ones surroundings, the currents and ebbing and receding of the Force, the attacks of an opponent, and the centered axis of ones inner-self; and once all of that is achieved, to then turn that flow outward--giving it a direction and purpose, whether it be ones opponent or a concept--such as fulfilling a goal. It starts with the passive action that gets turned to an unrelenting aggressive one, which somewhat mirrors Djem So philosophy. To be able to apply such a thing beyond a simple a philosophy or technique to be utilized, but rather as a mantra onto itself, that sort of accomplishment through the Force is not something any Padawan is expected to do or succeed in doing. For to be able to do such a thing through the Force one is typically--at the very least--a Knight, and while Hervor is older than many Knights, her power, talent, and ability within the Force was still immature.

Her skills and power did not really start to mature until she reached her first century, but to human reckoning she appeared to be in her early-twenties--the typical age of a young Jedi Knight. However, the time for training was replaced by being a time to put her training into use within a scenario that Jedi should not find themselves engaging... warfare.

The Mandalorians had consolidated themselves and begun their crusade once again in the Outer Rim, and it was within those battles Hervor lost herself and found herself again. The initial assault Hervor happened to be there, whether that is simply being extraordinarily unlucky, or in one view being at the right place at the right time, or by the Jedi's adage: 'there are no coincidences in matters of the Force'; and the Force is always with a Jedi.

The Mandalorians were making their assault to secure a province of farmlands to supply themselves with food, just as the Republic often likes to utilize Dantoonie for. That particular province and community of Dantoonie was one Hervor was known to enjoy visiting from having been there in the past during visits as a young Padawan to the Jedi Enclave with her master. The two of them would go on short walking pilgrimages through the fields of Dantoonie to return full circle to the Jedi Enclave. As she got older approaching adulthood at the age Laitra consider to be an adult outside of biology alone, she was given more and more freedom to do what she liked as trust was being afforded to her. The quiet sway of the winds blowing through the grassy fields of Dantoonie she had always been fond of, compelling her to revisit the area time and again.

Alone and fighting not just for her own survival, but every innocent life that was fired upon by Mandalorian warriors. It was a difficult lessen to learn, and a very human one, which is that in war--no matter how hard she fought, no matter how much she pushed herself--there was no way to save each life. There were those she watched be snatched away--or ruthlessly dragged away upon the ground as they screamed and cried out for someone to help them, anyone--but none was there. The life they had only to be deprived and destroyed, then claimed like an object to become an object--a slave. The children screaming, some dying in the explosions and fires. Most the Mandalorians were able to get their grasp upon were taken away with the the adults they managed to capture, destined to become their slaves.

To try so hard to fight for those you have learned to care about, only to lose those faces that she had grown so familiar with, watched grow up, tried to make life better for--only to have it be broken and wasted by the interference of the vile hand of another. Hervor learned the most cruel lesson of all, that for each she fought so hard to save and protect, she was condemning another to the merciless fate the Mandalorians had in store for them. That was what affected her most, it was her first true lesson she learned that begun to shape her philosophy of opposition that would make her who she is.

While she enabled the simple farms people to stave back the Mandalorian raid until Republic forces arrived to drive the Mandalorians out of the area. Much of Master Hjo's teachings of aggression served her well, but his specific methodology of 'passive-aggression' as he taught it, did not serve her well against the Mandalorians. Instead, what wound up serving her was distilling those teachings into a much more simplistic ideal to draw strength from and gain focus: to oppose. The more the Mandalorians fought against her will to protect the farmers, the more Hervor channelled her strength to oppose them. She fought them through attrition, making herself a wall to their goals. It was a single ideal that she utilized to empower herself through the Force to immense extents.

The lessons of aggression she learned from Master Hjo were somewhat derived from not just Djem So, but Juyo lightsaber duelist philosophies, many of which she had studied extensively by this point in her life. While her actual ability with Juyo was negligible at best, even so a lightsaber form's philosophies are more than just about the form itself, and far more in dealing with how to channel the Force in order to find the most efficient means to focus oneself to utilize the form in its totality. What Master Hjo taught and trained Hervor to understand within a frame of mind that aggressive action is not inherently wrong, for within all natural life there is a natural aggressive tendency and that does not make them of the dark side. However, reliance upon aggressive action constantly within ones life it becomes more and more difficult for one to have the freedom of thought to move without it; thus regressing them to being a blunt object with no forethought into why the action they are taking is being taken at all. The investment of thoughtfulness becomes erased.

Unsurprisingly, outside of learning the ideals of the lightsaber forms, even her physical conditioning was based on honing her speed and agility to utilize her favored lightsaber forms optimally. Strength can be augmented through the Force, and though so can ones speed and physical prowess. Having a natural leniency for swiftness and adroit movement as a lightsaber duelist was viewed by both Master Hjo and Hervor as being best. After all, what good is having so much strength if one cannot hit or even keep up with their target or opponent? On top of which the two forms, Ataru and Juyo, often seem to demand their practitioners to be quite spry to maintain a steady stream of attacks to keep ones opponent's back to the wall.

The Mandalorians had picked a fight with the Republic within the outskirts of the Outer Rim once again. It was never a question about how the Jedi were going to deal with the new threat the Mandalorians posed to the Republic, Hervor and six other Knights she had been close friends with for much of their lives, went straight into the fray. Any and every debate the Jedi and its leading bodies may have had on how to engage the Mandalorians, Hervor and her comrades bypassed it all and merely charged straight into the battles leading Republic forces against the Mandalorians. Hervor took upon herself the title of Jedi General, as well as her six other friends who chose to follow her into battle; and the Republic units and battalions they took command of were quick to regard them as owners of such a position. The deeper reasoning behind their following her would not be realized to the Jedi Council itself until the war's end.

Unique for a Padawan to take up the title of Jedi General, such a thing had been unheard of since the Mandalorian Wars a century ago. But for those who followed her it mattered. After all, when they were Padawans themselves it was she who was their tutor, for her own title of Padawan was in name only as she was just as strong as any Jedi Knight by that point in time in her life. Besides, in the events to that came as she lead her fellows into war, they all saw and recognized her as a Jedi Knight, and with all the hardships they came to suffer through with one another--to them it only cemented her holding such a rank.

In the times Hervor was not in the frontlines in battle, she went back to the Jedi Temple of Coruscant only for a day or two before returning to the front. With each return she went deep within the Jedi Archives not just doing her duties as a Jedi Archivist, but to leave behind her own "revelations". Some found her discoveries and realizations and theories to be a bit disturbing when they looked upon them within the Archives, and were often moved to sections of the Archives where only Masters could review them. They were never erased or destroyed because they held their insight, and felt it best for them to be archived--after all, ironically the largest archive of Sith and dark side knowledge (excluding Ossus) lies within the Jedi Archives of the Jedi Temple of Coruscant; so to destroy Hervor's own discoveries for having a dark edge to them would be hypocritical in a way.

What were Hervor's holocrons within the Jedi Archives on? Empowerment. Empowerment within battle and warfare. They were meticulous, indepth accounts and explanations about how to draw--not simply channel--but literally draw upon the strength of both enemies and allies alike to propel oneself forward with greater strength. Not in any symbolic method of empowerment, but more literal in the sense of syphoning strength--the Force--even life from them. It was dangerously similar to the Sith/Dark Jedi method of drawing power from others, which dealt with severing and/or interrupting connections of life to the Force to draw them inward into oneself to recover from depleting strength and heal ones wounds. Hervor’s method was a bit different but eerily similar, her method had nothing to do with severing or interrupting connections (nor healing ones wounds... at least not yet), it was not to stop the flow within life, but rather redirect part of that flow of life--the Force into oneself. It was but a mere step away from the horrid methods of what powerful Sith/Dark Jedi utilized to rob the very lives of others for their own gains through the Force via the dark side.

But it was not just this ‘technique’ she detailed within her holocrons, it was how to apply it within battle itself in conjunction with what disturbed some most of all was her developing philosophy of opposition. As she would explain in how to utilize it to strengthen ones resolve in battle and warfare for Jedi to take heed to, was the removal of doubt and embracing of absolutism, and that leway is of a ‘grey standard’. For if one is not willing to show an equal measure of severity an opponent is willing to show oneself, then that is partly condoning--and giving into the opponent's ideals as one stands in their way. Which in Hervor’s lessons was acceptance of their ideal, and if one is to oppose another to empower oneself to the greatest degree, everything about the opposition must be utterly rejected in its entirety--nothing can be condoned or accepted, it all must be opposed. This was concerning because it was a very small step from her philosophy of opposition to outright disdain, which can quickly lead to a very dark path.

The Council of the time and many others wanted to speak with her about these ‘additions’ of hers, but their summons for her went ignored each and every time. She simply would immediately go back to the frontlines without a word or even the simplest acknowledgment. In her mind, she did not want to waste her time with debate and being questioned--she was focused on the immediate problem of the Mandalorians, only doing her Arcivists duties when she felt she had the time to spare. Like Jedi have in the past, it was clear that yet again several Jedi have been sucked into the Mandalorians need for war and battle, and it had begun to shape these Jedi until their Code and clarity had lost its meaning.

They were not the only Jedi who went to battle with the Mandalorians at the time, but Hervor and her friends were most definitely one of the most known for the time. Their successes turned many heads. But the price of those successes were often exceedingly high, and at times it was a wonder they succeeded as well as they did. For Hervor was quoted numerous times while strategizing with Republic officers of the battalion that she and her friends lead, she had no interest in repeating Revan’s known strategies of hurling Republic forces in mass droves at the Mandalorians to where it reached a point of it being ten to twenty Republic soldiers for every one Mandalorian. That she considered to be not only unsound strategy, but a weak one as well. The war of attrition she sought to wage against the Mandalorians she wanted to be far more thought-out, but then again unlike Revan she held no interest in creating an environment that would lead Jedi at mass to the dark side. The Mandalorian Wars from a a century she had no will or desire to repeat--or rather ignite as the this campaign was on a far smaller scale and did not want it to exacerbate; and what some hailed as a colossal--if not controversial--victory in regards to the Mandalorian War, she saw as a template for failure and not to be repeated, largely because of its resulting aftermath of the wars that followed.

But, despite Hervor’s aspirations, some things were destined to be repeated, for history and time are simply endless cycles that play out more often than sentient species dare to count or admit. A war of attrition through just throwing bodies at the enemy was something she knew to be unnecessary through not just common sense, but through the simple fact she was a very regarded and highly educated young Jedi Archivist. Through studying the Archives for years, and since becoming a Knight and Archivist, she has had far greater access to them. In studying the Mandalorians within the Great Sith War and the Mandalorian Wars, she understood that despite the Mandalorians overloading everything with more guns and their vaunted beskar metals, the Republic is not only far more well funded and supplied better, it also made them more technologically superior. The one with the greater resources typically wins the war. The Mandalorians in comparison to the Republic is minute, and thereby so are the Mandalorians resources--hence why they often raided other regions for supplies--not just because it is a sound strategy--but because she understood they had much fewer than the Republic; and that is what she struck out at first before striking at them directly. Her goal was to gradually choke the life out of them until they could no longer breath.

She called it ‘hard war’, albeit not an uncommon term to some war historians and generals along with the term ‘total war' which means precisely the same thing. When she struck at the Mandalorians, the battalion she lead with her dear friends did so with relatively few supplies of their own. For one simple fact, they would lay claim to the Mandalorians resources or have none themselves. They wanted to keep on the move, and this meant not carrying more than they could afford to carry and protect during assaults. On top of which the main problem would be where Hervor was striking at the Mandalorians on one of their very own held worlds within Mandalorian space with only a single battalion.

The battles were relegated to Shogun, but being so deep within Mandalorian space ahead of Republic forces, meant communication with the primary Republic fleets was difficult to say the least, and even communication with Republic Intelligence was more than a little difficult. Hervor’s reports to the fleets were typically only done when she would make quick trips out to Coruscant to go to the Jedi Temple, which became more and more sparse as the war effort escalated. When the Jedi Council barred Hervor from the Jedi Archives and suspended her Jedi Archivist duties until she would meet with them, she stopped making runs sneaking out of Mandalorian space altogether and focused solely on fighting the Mandalorians on their own soil. At which point her reports to the Republic fleets of her movements became more sparse by proxy. The Republic fleet itself did not come charging as they did not want to spark yet another large scale war with the Mandalorians, and the initial attacks were done by only a few clans who were traced to Shogun.

When she struck at the Mandalorians resource bases and caches, not only would she take the Mandalorians own weapons and tech to utilize for her battalion (what essentially was her own little army), and thus use them against the Mandalorians themselves. The foundries, mines, and land in which was used to cultivate not just resources for making weapons and tools of war, but food and medicine and other essentials, she ordered the soldiers to basically “salt the earth”. She nuked the area--scorched the earth so nothing could grow back or be used again. Of course, this was only after she took what her army needed and moved on.

Even her dropping out of space onto Shogun was particularly vicious. As the entire ship would be emptied and everyone would drop to the surface using the vessel's dropships/shuttles, while they simultaneously scuttled their ships via using them as asteriods dropped on top of the Mandalorians, which by proxy the base that Hervor chose to crash the vessels down upon would be utterly devastated into nothing more than ruins; and in turn leave their resource bases vulnerable. From there Hervor and those who followed her, would march on those resource bases--and as described prier: sack them, take what they needed, then raze the entire area beyond recovery, and move on to the next.

It was inevitable that out of her utter opposition toward the Mandalorians, she begun to develop an immense disdain for them. The more one learns to oppose another, the more they learn to view everything about them as wrong and flawed, and these flaws are constantly seen and become too familiar. This familiarity breeds contempt, disdain settles in a greater manifestation, and with that disdain it is not long until treating the disdained without civility, for in one’s eyes the disdained are seen as less than ‘human‘. Once a person is seen as less than ‘human’, decadency enters the scene.

It begun with the prisoners, they had to be on the move continuously, so they could only take relatively few, and supplies were limited, so those they were unwilling to keep were executed. It was not long until they begun refusing to even feed the few prisoners they had. But it became worse when the Mandalorians laid out explosive traps and mines in the path of Hervor’s army as the Mandalorian scouts reported where it was moving. Hervor’s response to this was to move the Mandalorian prisoners to the front of their march and the convoys, and have them search for those traps and mines with Republic sharpshooters’ sights trained on them. If soldiers were going to be sacrificed to disarm the Mandalorians own traps, she chose to sacrifice the Mandalorian prisoners to them rather than her explosive engineers. Unfortunately for the prisoners, relatively few of them knew explosives as well as their own explosive experts. It is likely the Mandalorians never took into account that not only a Republic officer but a Jedi would force their prisoners to disarm their own traps or be executed. Thus often times lead to the prisoners either dying by improperly disarming an explosive trap or mine, or shot dead by a Republic sharpshooter for refusing to disarm the one they found whether by indignation or fear or both. But what made it worse, was the remains Hervor had her own scouts send to the Mandalorians.

This was the epitome of Hervor’s war of attrition against the Mandalorians, she was relentless--the harder the Mandalorians would push against her, the deeper she would dig in her feet to hold her ground, and then respond by bring down the hammer even harder than the Mandalorians. The cost of life was staggering in her battles, but what she proved was well-trained, battle-proven Republic forces fighting along side a handful of Jedi can not only go stride for stride with the Mandalorians but even break them. What Hervor was accomplishing on the ground--eroding the Mandalorians on their own worlds, enabled the Republic fleets to move in and finish the Mandalorians off.

Of those Jedi Knights who were Hervor’s closest and dearest friends, only two remained with her to fight along side her in the final battles against the Mandalorians, for the rest had all parished. When it was all at last drawn to a close none remained alive. The fellowship of friends who went to war totaled in seven, and by its close only two remained as the fires of war claimed the rest. What remained of Hervor’s battalion, it would be generous to say less than half made it home, but it would be far more accurate to say only a third survived. The cost was severe, but with that severe cost what Hervor was able to accomplish as she and her allies led a battalion on a campaign across a Mandalorian world alone in all out warfare of attrition was nothing shy of astounding.

The evidence of what Hervor had become could be felt in her very presence, the war had scarred her beyond the superficial facial scar on the left side of her face from a stray piece of shrapnel. Her presence was dark, as if all the colors of life had been drained out of it by the void wrought from love lost. Hervor had fallen. Most believe it was the war with all the fighting and death she experienced. But it is such a shallow understanding of the why, the war definitely played a role--but it is only the tip of the iceberg of what truly caused it. The dark side Hervor in the beginning was able to stave off with all the piety one would expect from a devout Jedi Knight following the path of the light. But--what wound up destroying her--damning her even--was love, or rather--the emptiness left behind when that love dies.

It is a little known fact, generally believed to be rumor only, that Hervor and her six friends were not only Force-bonded to each other, but each loved the other deeply. The fellowship was a fellowship of love, bonded through the Force not merely by their comradeship as Jedi and friends, but their love and affection they held for each other. It was an idealic love they held for one another, when the weight of inevitability begun to make the knees of one buckle under the pressure, needing another to help them share the burden, dispel loneliness with a loving embrace or a sensual night of companionship--at least one of them was sure to be there.

But such a deeply bonded love, when one was suddenly no longer there--they felt it collectively, and collectively felt the pain of their loss and the resulting emptiness that forever lingered with their absence. A bond is never truly gone, for the feeling of its emptiness is forever felt. Hervor knew them all their lives, and they grew up knowing her as the experienced Padawan that guided them in their youth, and upon gaining their Knighthood, she was looked up to as their leader. The love one feels for those they known and bonded with for much ones own life and all of theirs, is un-quantifiable; and so is the pain felt by the void they leave behind when they are gone.

In private moments all it did was make Hervor become a desperate and despondent figure whose eyes were filled with so many tears she could barely even see anything. Alone in private Hervor could barely breath the loss of her dearest friends afflicted her so deeply, it was a wound that was ripped wider with each death. As the pain and emptiness she felt with their deaths grew the more she fell. In this way, love in warfare, her fall was destined. For the Jedi, she was the ultimate modern cautionary tale for them to tell about the dangers of both war and attachments.

Most believe it was because she was attempting to avoid the Jedi, but the reasons are a bit more complicated than that. In truth she cared nothing for the Jedi at that point in time, and since her fall would welcome their challenge to her, both philosophically... and martially. However, there were too many memories back on Coruscant, ones she has no desire to have recalled by the sights, even the smell in the air. Acknowledging her own fall to the dark side and what were undeniably warcrimes she committed. She could not conceivably see any rational reason to return, outside of surrendering herself to the Jedi; and that she had no intention of doing. The Mandalorian insurgents ceased-fire, Hervor knew that with the battles settled the Jedi would seek her out. But, she was not willing to engage with Jedi, even with just words, for the very reasoning she did not see them as an enemy as she the Mandalorians--when in any other circumstance she would have welcomed their challenge.

Master Hjo in all of this became numb, everything he had hoped and dreamed for Hervor was gone, and the legacy of his teachings and knowledge he had sought to pass on to his pupil, he now only could see crumble away in his hands and fall between his fingers.

It was difficult for Master Hjo to know exactly what to take away from all that he learned and heard about his pupil in what she had become. A century he became the Grandmaster of the Order, then a half century later he chose to retire from the position and took on Hervor as his pupil; and now he is just an another failed Jedi master wandering the halls of the Jedi Temple trying to understand his pupil's fall and his own failure in that process, regardless of what his pupil's companion told him. No amount of ruminations enabled him to understand it, perhaps it was something deeper in that he did not want to understand it. But the only conclusion he reached was he must confront his pupil, for even in darkness, he still considered her his student his responsibility.

Over and over again, he reviewed the holocrons that Hervor created and left within the Jedi Archives, seeking to understand what Hervor's frame of mind maybe a bit more indepth. He saw them before, many times in fact while she was out engaging the Mandalorians, but at this point it was simply to see or understand something he may have missed in the past. But there was nothing, it was what it was.

The fallen Jedi Knight was still his responsibility, and while he took action to find her, he was hesitant to face her martially if he believed it may come to that, and by her own philosophy it just may. His largest concern for this was simply being aware of what he taught to her. His methodology and philosophy surrounded three lightsaber forms: Ataru, Djem So, and the lesser known form of Juyo. Each of which he taught to his pupil, though she had none of them mastered, they were taught for her to develop her own personalized style from them--mastery of each form would come with time; thus enhancing the overall efficiency and potency of her personalized style. Each of those forms are among the most aggressive styles of lightsaber forms, and the greatest of lightsaber duelists the Jedi have to offer tend to know at least one or two of them, if not all.

In his youth, Master Hjo was an exceptional lightsaber duelist, but as he got older and no matter how much he used the Force to enhance his movements, he simply just was not as spry as he used to be; therefore as he got older the more he fell back on manipulating, channeling, and controlling the Force. Martially he set Hervor on the same path in his teachings to be as good if not better lightsaber duelist than he was, and what he taught her martially she took quite to heart. It went undenied that her talent as a lightsaber duelist was well above par, and understood his lessons well. The foundation of those being Djem So, designed in the same defensive spirit as Soresu, only with a more aggressive edge to it--its primary focus for every attack upon the practitioner they in turn respond with an attack themselves. Its goal being to eliminate the slower technique of Soresu that can lead to the pitfall of drawing out a battle far longer than it need be by being too defensive.

Layered on top of that Djem So training was training into Ataru to take advantage of its technique of blending a Jedi's ability to enhance their movements incrementally into a highly acrobatic form, designed specifically for out-maneuvering ones opponent. Also an aggressive form, it is dependent upon maintaining a steady stream of attacks from differing angles to overwhelm the opponent. As some say, it is to make an opponent feel like they are facing two opponents when really they are only facing one. This blended with Djem So's defense-counter-offense techniques, lends itself well to grant both forms more adaptability offensively and defensively by way of greater movement and finesse.

Albeit, they were infused with Juyo principals and intermittent techniques wrought through bold ferocity from within the practitioner. Juyo was the bridge point between the connecting of Djem So and Ataru to form the greater whole of Hervor's personalized style. Now it must be mentioned it took far more years for Hervor to ever master Juyo. But Master Hjo understood, all knowledge comes with time, and while Hervor knew a modicum of the style--he understood perfectly well that she knew enough so that with time she could master it completely. As it stood, she is still a young Morellian woman, her ability and talent is still maturing, though he wondered how much both fighting in a war against the Mandalorians and having fallen to the dark side may have strengthened her.

Because of the inner ferocity required for Juyo, it is incredibly unique for a master to teach the form to their student(s), and often caution against doing such a thing. Sith and Dark Jedi seldom ever have such reservations as the form lends itself well to fallen lightsaber duelists, who often fall back on their rage for furious, unpredictable attacks. However, Master Hjo believed so long as a student was taught how to maintain an inner-temperance, they could counter-balance the inner fury that is utilized for Juyo's wild, kentic method of fierceness in combat. For the most part he was correct, however, Hervor's own introspective ideals and experiences in war had undone much of what Master Hjo had taught her about inward restraint when using Juyo's form and techniques.

((Continued...))

[Apillis]

Despite her advanced ability as a lightsaber duelist, Master Hjo understood perfectly what her greatest weakness is. Her ability to harness the Force itself is unimpressive (such as telekinetics and telepathy), it would take her far more years to make up for her lack of ability in use of the Force due to her extensive lightsaber training. With time, another century even, she may be able to make up for that gap in her training, but as it stood currently, her ability in the Force beyond simple physical enhancements was minute.

Albeit, given her beginning to learn methods of drawing upon strength from surrounding life, she may have set herself upon the path of finding a way to make up for where she was lacking; and there are primal, instinctual techniques within the dark side that bridge the gap between many weaknesses and strengths. Let it not be said the dark side is wanting in what it can offer to the tempted. And with someone like his pupil, that was what concerned him most of all, for her having been an Archivist (even if only briefly) and having trained to be an Archivist nearly all her life, Hervor knows this well.

In the end, it took him well-over a decade to locate her, and that was with the aid of two Jedi Shadows...

What lead him to the trail was a year after Hervor's disappearance there were reports from Jedi Shadows of a fallen Jedi that matched Hervor's description hunting down Mandalorian insurgents who were dissatisified and unwilling to give up fighting while the Mandalorians at large were pacified for the most part. With time as the early insurgent insurrections begun to die down, a Dark Jedi with Hervor's description begun cropping up in the Outer Rim worlds eliminating Mandalorian mercenary bands and bounty hunters, aside from what little remained of the insurgents. According to reports this seemed to be out of the fallen Jedi's own ambition, yet somewhat against the usual apparent modus operandi of this the fallen Jedi would become a sword-for-hire as it were, specifically for jobs that solely involved eliminating Mandalorians, whether it be one or several. Generally it was done purely for the sake of the presumed desire of the fallen Jedi to kill them rather than for credits. But given those jobs were rare, it is believed those contracts were simply for credits to live off of for a time.

But the fallen Jedi was cautious, and often caught wind of the Jedi Shadows that would manage to find her trail--like a mother feeling danger threaten what is most precious, and thus would lead to her evacuating the entire system altogether. For decades this lasted. During that time a few of his peers often told Master Hjo to let it be, Hervor went her way, and that way was to engage in constant battle against the Mandalorians who equally see her as an enemy. Sometimes it is best for Jedi not to insert themselves in a conflict that does not involve them. But Master Hjo argued if it was Hervor, she is his pupil, and he is a Jedi, thus the conflict does involve the Jedi, or at least--a Jedi.

The reality being the battles never truly ended for Hervor, and in a way, it never ended for the Mandalorians, either. For the Mandalorians who chose to be insurgents or go off to hunt or take the lives of others as bounty hunters, assassins, or mercenaries--as a culture they define themselves through conflict and battle, and thus as soldiers of fortune, it was the only way they continue to define themselves through the essence of their culture. For Hervor, it was a little more simplistic, they kept on fighting, so to her they never truly surrendered--those who she saw as refusing to surrender, needed to be broken or die--often times she found confrontations with them lead to the latter.

On the Mandalorian side of things, the insurgents were aware of Hervor's continued battle with them. Unsurprisingly far more than a few remember her actions during the war. Because they were directly involved for obvious reasons in Hervor's continued conflict with them, they were far more aware of Hervor and her actions than Master Hjo and his Jedi Shadow aids. Furthermore unsurprisingly those insurgents were hunting her down as well, but after their confrontations, Hervor would manage to evade them--largely because there would be no survivors. Though, it would not be too much to say that Hervor often found herself repeatedly amused by their hunting her, for it made it easier for her to find them and eliminate them directly.

The anger the Mandalorians made her feel, it could never be sated--it only made her seethe even more their refusal to concede to their crushing defeats over the course of history. The blatant evidence that their culture has failed time and again, that with each uprising they are defeated--and yet they still persist in believing their culture is somehow superior, and each failure is ignored under some delusional belief the next time they wage war they will be more successful. How many lives must die because of that blind arrogance of ignoring the results of history? It infuriated her they could not see it, it infuriated her even more that those she loved died while proving their arrogance unjustified. The fact their philosophy and culture had no reasoning, no art, no clarity, no forethought outside of a cycle of death wrought solely through warfare. It disgusted her. To her the Mandalorians are a culture that digresses sentient beings into primates.

It was a rage that burned bright within her, the greater her hatred and anger welled up within her--the more she used it fuel herself, strengthen herself--use the power she gained from it to unleash on those she opposed. While rage, anger--such emotions for many are seen as a weakness for being primal and base, thus easily manipulated; but some practitioners of the dark side, they take that anger--their rage--harness its power to overwhelm their opposition to crush them. Causing in a way a reversal effect where what the opponent thought to be weakening the enraged individual or at least make them act more foolishly, they have only made them more powerful--stronger, and more driven and focused with an even greater purpose to fight. Over the course of a decade since the end of the battles on Shogun with the Mandalorians, this was something Hervor learned how to utilize to great effect, using her rage to amplify her speed, endurance and strength to immense extents.

Through her training as a lightsaber duelist as a Dark Jedi within those decades she learned much about her inner-hatreds and rage, and harness its strength--use it as raw power to inflict upon others. In her eyes the turmoils would never end, not truly, because like dumb animals driven only by the instinct they know--the Mandalorians would continue to fight a war they could never possibly win at one point or another. In Hervor's eyes, she was a representation of how their sad attempts to take their warfare to the galactic stage would only end in failure; so at every turn she sought to quash them with the might of her rage and the power of the dark side she wielded.

But the march of time only carries ever onward, Hervor became more sparse in the Jedi Shadow's investigations, perhaps because she was figuring out how to best evade them. However, Master Hjo was learning to move on in that time as his Morellian years were nearing his third century, over half-way into his second. Obsessing over the loss of pupil was not good for him nor the best way to serve the Order as a Jedi, in fact, the best way he could do that--was by taking another pupil. And that pupil was an Epicanthix by the name of Xica, passing on the same lessons to her as he did to Hervor. However, her take on them proved dramatically different. In fact, the Juyo form she never sought to learn but instead took on learning the Soresu form in its place. On the short side for an Epicanthix, should she and Hervor stand face to face they would be of equal height, even similar build.

Peaceful, serene--she was what Hervor was not, in many ways the two could be looked upon as complete polars. Their only similarities lay within the training and who trained them, but the two went in completely different directions with what they had been taught. But the ever unavoidable reality of time was what Master Hjo feared most of all, history was repeating itself. The Mandalorians were staging another grand crusade, only this one was far larger than the few clans from Shogun that attacked a few Outer Rim settlements that Hervor and her companions subdued. This was on the galactic scale, it was the Mandalorians as a whole mobilizing.

It was something that Master Hjo dreaded, a pupil unwittingly mimicking the failure of another--going off to engage in warfare. It was Xica and five of her dearest friends, similar to how it was in the past--merely one short. Master Hjo tried to argue and debate Xica not to fight, but she would not be swayed as her earnest desire to protect the settlers of the Outer Rim was unwavering. Perhaps that was something else that was similar to his previous pupil. Dissuaded even after he told the uncensored tale of his last pupil, Xica left the Jedi Temple to engage in war along side her dear friends.

They joined up with a Republic army (one of several shipped out to fight off the Mandalorians). But... taking the reins of a division of that army was a dark figure who kept her distance. All the Republic officers would say was that she was a Jedi General from years ago who fought a bloody campaign with Mandalorian insurgents. Xica from the onset had a feeling she knew who it was, but was hesitant to approach her at first, while her companions chose to do the same. For it was clear to each of their perceptions she was a fallen Jedi--her presence was a violent darkness full of volatility brimming with a hatred they had never felt or experienced in all of their training.

The battles for their army begun on Shogun, and while the battalions under their command suffered--the division under the dark one within their army was ruthlessly efficient. It followed an agenda and strategy that mirrored closely to Master Hjo's tale of his former pupil. It was after the first couple battles, Xica at last chose to approach the dark one. The amount of rage she felt from the individual overwhelmed her senses, it was like nothing she had felt before, and they stood before one another--she was greeted amicably. To say the least, while Xica expected an act violence against her from the person, they instead welcomed her with a friendly smile and a kind conversation. But it all confirmed Xica's suspicions, and she was amazed with exactly how open and divulging she was about who she was and what she was and what she had done in the past, though she became evasive when it came to the issue of the loss of those closest to her.

What Xica found most odd though was that Hervor gave Xica the exact same warnings that Master Hjo, though while Master Hjo tried to stop Xica with these warnings, Hervor gave them without the intent of prevention but rather a 'just watch' tone and smirk. Xica told her companions about her encounters with Hervor, and while they agreed eventually they may have to deal with her eventually--given the current setting they find themselves in--the Mandalorians are the greater threat, and Hervor had yet to direct any hostility toward them, she seemed utterly focused on the Mandalorians defeat.

More and more as the battles progressed Xica found herself gravitating toward Hervor and Hervor in turn with her. War drives allies--even those of convenience closer together, and the disarming seemingly amicable nature of Hervor, Xica never felt threatened in her presence, but given how ferociously she fought the Mandalorians, especially when the Republic soldiery and Xica and her companions were in danger--Xica begun to feel protected by her; and even Xica's companions begun to see Hervor as more an ally than a potential enemy as a result. And with Hervor's successes through her methods of 'hard war', Xica and her companions begun to gradually mirror them. But it haunted Xica in a way, because she could see what Hjo and Hervor had warned her of happening right before her very eyes, the inevitable slide into darkness. Subtle though it was, she could still observe it, even see it in herself. She was not certain whether to hate Hervor for showing her how simplistic it was or love her for it, the same for exposing such a side of herself for that matter.

It was not even that Hervor influenced anything herself, she merely lead and they eventually begun to fall in line with her ways and adhering to her experience and leadership. She simply commanded and expected people to follow and they did. The companions of Xica she watched their gradual fall under Hervor's leadership, and not even by Hervor's direct hand--not even a real push, but rather simply by their own choices replacing their compassion for calculation, empathy for detachment, kindness for mercilessness. The war was shaping them in the exact manner that Hervor had outlined and warned Xica when they first spoke. She called it inevitability--they way of things, the frontlines of a battlefield is a death and indifference. When Jedi do not remove themselves from it, it shapes them--most Jedi do not even realize it has convincing themselves they detached themselves from it, but no one ever walks away from war unaffected, especially the frontlines of battle--more so when it becomes their day to day surrounded by the ever constant darkness of death's inevitability. Hervor merely watched it all with a smile.

But what affected Xica most was precisely what affected Hervor and what truly had pulled her down into the dark side, the progressive deaths of her dear friends. Connected to them through the Force, feeling each of their deaths through it and feeling the lingering emptiness within in ones heart--ones spirit when they are gone, the feeling of that pain is a cruelty in its way. Xica questioned whether or not a truly harmonious universe with the Force actually existed to suffer such an absence--a void within the heart like that.

It carried on through their battles on Shogun, their utilizing stolen Mandalorian vessels as meteors to rain down upon Concord Dawn's surface when they invade and razed it just as they did Shogun, and lastly took those tactics to make the Mandalorian homeworld Mandalore burn with the rest of the Republic fleet. They may not have been the only Jedi fighting the Mandalorians during the last great crusade, but their campaign against the Mandalorians with their army was certainly one of the most well know or infamous pending ones view of it. With the loss of each companion Xica found herself seeking comfort in Hervor's arms, which left Hervor often surprised in the beginning, but realized she needed that comfort as well and welcomed it. While with the deaths of her friends Xica felt the turmoil of the emptiness they left behind in her heart, ironically the Force bond forging with a dark Jedi steeped in death was giving her solace from the losses; whereas for Hervor it was enabling to feel something she had not experienced in a long, long time... love.

In a twisted way the worst thing for Hervor was the end of the Mandalorians final crusade, for Xica had made her decision to return to the Jedi Order. It would be a lie to say Hervor did not feel a certain betrayal and jealousy toward the Jedi Order, for something she had not felt and experienced in years was being destroyed simply because her love was a Jedi following the tenets of the Order. Hervor's pleas and protests to Xica was met with sorrowful apologies and words of obligations and duties, slave to her own honor bound soul. It infuriate Hervor--it gave her a new hatred--a hatred of the Jedi and by great irony it was wrought from her love of a Jedi Knight.

Xica who remained with the Jedi, it was through her that the Jedi learned everything about the events that transpired. She spoke with a candor that took even the Jedi Masters of the Council off-guard about what was done, what was experienced, what was felt, about the fellowship's idealistic love for one another, about what she herself did. It was also through her they gained more insight about the crimes Hervor committed in her anger long ago, about Hervor's inevitable fall, and about why there were those willing to follow her--and why if the war were still raging, she herself would continue to follow her.

After everything Xica explained to them--told them, what they did not understand was her statement said with a certainty and conviction that held not even the smallest iota of hesitation that despite it all, she would still follow Hervor if the war still went on. When asked why, her reply was asking if they did not understand the seven companions each loved one another. The war for them in the beginning was a question about what they were willing fight and protect, but as it went on, and with all the pain and suffering they endured together. It became a question of how hard were they willing to fight, how far were they willing to go, what were they willing to do for that which they loved above all else. In time in Hervor they saw an example to follow, Hervor's devotion may have been corrupted and twisted by the dark side, but each within their fellowship understood and could feel through the bond shared by each of them--that she would stop at nothing for them, her dedication had no limits. The comfort in knowing she had that much resolve for them and their cause could not be measured, and there was never a time she felt safest than when she was in Hervor's arms.

Given the warcrimes Hervor committed, the Council had to ask why nothing was done to stop her from doing them. Was it love or fear or both that prevented them from stopping her? By Xica's account it was a lack of empathy on their part, they simply stopped concerning themselves with the lives of a culture that held no empathy outside of its own. The Council pointed out to Xica that such a train of thought is hypocritical and makes them no better than the Mandalorians. Xica's response was they did not care at the time if they were being hypocritical, they were more focused on making the Mandalorians feel the same fear they instilled their own victims with on the Mandalorians own ground--it was vengeance, they held no interest in demonstrating to the Mandalorians how to maintain a moral high ground in warfare. The Council questioned if they understood by doing that they were allowing the Mandalorians' and Hervor's aggression to shape them. To which Xica responded, they understood that from the beginning, but they eventually reached a consensus that they simply did not care, and thus conceded to becoming the monsters the Mandalorians created in order to destroy the Mandalorians themselves, thereby destroying them by their own methods and beliefs and philosophy.

However, she explained, Hervor was not content with that, while Hervor and her companions turned the Mandalorians own ways and philosophy against them--Hervor instituted her philosophy of opposition, refining and articulating it through war in order to break them. With each death of a soldier and especially one of their companions, the more implacable Hervor became--until the pain of the loss of each of those who died, she fed upon the pain of the wound they left behind with their parting and it empowered her to continue opposing the Mandalorians with a brutal will. It was her way of seeking to break their philosophy with her own.

When the days approached that Xica finally had some reprieve from the Council’s continual questioning about the events of her crusade along side Hervor, Master Hjo approached her to learn more in depth about what exactly happened to his pupils. His question was a simple word: how? Xica’s response was asking him just how well did he know his either of his pupils. There had always been a volatility to Hervor, as a Jedi she merely learned how to keep herself in check and not let it rule her. But facing the Mandalorians for the first time on Dantoonie, she begun to question the wisdom in holding back. Xica reminded the old master something that Jedi often forget when training their pupils, that despite how much control they may teach a student, it is no promise that the student’s personality may see such lessons are unneeded via their own conclusions and experiences. When Jedi forget that caveat, they inevitability become surprised by their pupil's fall. It happens when Jedi become complacent in the wisdom of their own teachings.

He wondered what it was during her battles that she saw and experienced that served as the genesis for her fall. Xica shook her head, she explained to him that it begun long before then, as it always does before the event that leads to the tripping down into the chasm. She made it clear that it was never anything that Master Hjo taught, but rather, Hervor’s own ideals and experiences born among the Jedi themselves. When an event occurs, and it is seen by many, despite having been raised within the temple walls like they all have, it does not mean they will all perceive it the same way. Hervor would see something one way, while Master Hjo another, the failure was communication. Whatever turmoil Hervor was going through, whatever anger she felt--and she had much of it, she never saw any reason to share these problems and sought to deal with them introspectively causing them to fester instead.

By the time of the Mandalorians attack a century ago to the last crusade, she did not see much point in restraining her anger with them, and her companions felt much the same, as did Xica's. In the beginning it started out as aiding the Republic, taking on a leadership role to protect its people, but leading quickly turned into commanding. From there commanding became hardline assaults. These aggressive assaults turned into relentless tenacity unwilling to give quarter. No quarter became no mercy, and no mercy became seeing the Mandalorians as less than human--as animals; and then the true atrocities began right in stride with Hervor’s gradual fall. Xica watched the same with her own friends, and assured Master Hjo that Hervor’s failure to the Jedi Code was her own, and never his, though that knowledge may not have granted him any comfort to rest easy.

Master Hjo remarked that Xica’s experiences in war seemed to have made her quite wise and insightful than she was before engaging the war. The veteran Jedi Knight merely shook her head before saying, despite the fact she may not have fallen as her friends and Hervor did, she was still no more wiser than Hervor. Pain grants wisdom, and she and Hervor suffered through much in warfare together. Master Hjo attempted to argue that Hervor did not learn from that pain what she should have; to which Xica replied that to a Jedi that is true. The old master asked, that even knowing this she still followed Hervor; but Xica was quick to answer back wondering if he knew what love is and not just the Jedi concept of it. The hopefulness that once shined bright in Xica's eyes had faded away, and the warm smile of placidity she had also disappeared after all she had gone through and what plagued her conscience. No one walks away the same from warfare.

With Hervor having cropped up again, Master Hjo decided to seek her out once again. But Xica cautioned her master to let it be, Hervor did not see the Jedi as an enemy quite yet, but a hatred--a resentment was building toward it, and it would be best to starve Hervor's rage rather than give it cause and purpose. Master Hjo on the other hand disagreed, for her saw Hervor as a walking danger to anyone she comes across fueled by dark impulses and desires. Xica reached to the point she begged Master Hjo not to go after Hervor, and it was obvious to him the reason why, she was compelled by love and the fear of losing that which she has fallen with. Albeit, what he did not consider was that she also feared losing someone who was a father to her by the hands of the one she loved. That idea of that was horrific in its way.

Difficulty in finding Hervor, Master Hjo this time found to be quite easy. It seemed as though his former pupil expected him. She was at the ruins of the staging point where she begun her crusade on Shogun in her initial battles with the Mandalorians--in truth she waited for him there. She knew her old master would be right back out there searching for her once again the moment she cropped back up and the dust settled after the war. So she waited for him, and right on cue there he was. By this point Hervor had grown truly tired of Jedi, while making an allowance for one, but even that one--was slave to the Jedi's tenets and codes and bylaws and superfluous nonsense. It sickened her, always in her way was the Jedi's ponderous meandering and trite structure and over-inflated traditions and useless cultural retinue. It lead her to asking the question: why did she have to hide from them? She found herself at a loss for an answer.

Master Hjo approached to open dialogue--lend sought after guidance, see if the pupil he had once trained and raised was still there. But that girl had died long ago, consumed by the being she had become, devoured by her Laitra nature. Hervor simply answered with her blade, she was tired of it all. Tired of the Jedi's nonsense, tired of the routine, tired of fleeing, tired of hiding, tired of their posturing and vaunted piety and self-proclaimed enlightened wisdom. All she could see in them was stagnation and pomposity. Engaging Master Hjo in battle, she knew what she wanted--she wanted their blood, and if the first Jedi blood she had to spill was her former master than that is how the Force willed it.

Nearing three centuries old Master Hjo's knowledge and power was great, but his physical being was that of a wizened old man. And Hervor halfway into her second century, she was at her physical peak, and while her power may not have reached its full potential, her power was enough to enable her to be a challenge to Master Hjo. And as he hypothesized years ago, while she lacked ability in telekinesis or telepathy, the dark side was generous to those who gave into its temptations and drank from its power, and Hervor was drunk from its power. The dark side is a pathway to many abilities that enabled to bridge her shortcomings in the Force. The lightning she could summon by this point in comparison to when she fought the Mandalorians a century ago and now was a staggering extreme. The power of which ripped right through Master Hjo's defenses outside of his own lightsaber.

It did not matter that Master Hjo was Hervor's superior in terms of skill and raw power, for it was resilience that was on Hervor's side, and that was something that worked continually worked against Master Hjo both in terms of his age and Hervor's power in the dark side. Her rage continually fueled her, utilizing the power of the Force to will herself back onto her feet every time she was knocked down, and with her dark rage empowering her strength and speed, she chipped away at Master Hjo's resilience. Summoning her lightning the tormenting pain only weakened further. When she tired, she tore the very life from him to rejuvenate herself in turn having taken the lessens of using the lives around oneself to feed off of to continue pressing ever forward, which in turn only withered the old man further.

It was a testament to the power of the dark side, and its very nature. For the dark side is patient and it always wins. While even the smallest light can hold back the darkness, but in that weakness lies its greatest strength, for darkness is eternal and ever expanding, it does not need to eclipse the light--it just needs to wait it out, for even the stars eventually burn out. And Master Hjo's light had shined bright, but Hervor knew she did not need to overpower him, just erode him--wait for his strength to burn itself out, and then accomplish the coup de grace. Just like that... she severed his head. It was a cold indifference in that moment, she only looked upon his corpse for a second--took his lightsaber and left, disappearing from the scene.

As mentioned before, and mused by Master Hjo, do to her large focus on lightsaber combat, her ability to fight from a distance was lacking. Mandalorians primarily all fight at range with a wide arsenal of weaponry, and a lightsaber alone is not always the best for to dealing with this. But she learned over the years since her fall--drawing from literal strength from of those within her proximity she could fuel herself, and more so channel that energy for unleashing greater power. The further she fell she simply took it to its next most logical extreme, rather than simply drawing power from others strength--she simply drained it all from their very life--severing the connection between the victim(s) and the Force to continue to fuel her own power with their very lives.

Draining power from the very lives of others to fuel oneself, lead her to further channel that power through herself in a variety of ways. Many times she used it to further propel herself in combat, other times to exert as raw dark energy--summoning forth powerful bolts of lightning from her fingertips. The latter wound up being something she utilized exceedingly often in conjunction with her talent for draining life from others, and thereby using her victim(s) life (lives) to amplify the power and even the enormity of the lightning she was unleashing. With time eventually the extent and power she learned to harness the dark side with, and her ability at draining lives and unleashing dark side power in the form of lightning was great enough where to combine the two draining the life from target and using the power from imbuing their life to unleash another technique within the dark side upon another target.

By the end of the confrontation, Hervor, once again disappeared into obscurity. But this was what many believed to be the genesis of "The Hervor Crisis", but truthfully as the holocron within the Archives originally created by Master Hjo details, the genesis of it begun much earlier. The dark side is patient, and just when one may think it has surfaced or reared its head, they find themselves proven wrong--it was simply opening its eyes from its slumber at the time until it decides to truly rise from its dormancy.

The Hervor Crisis itself was genocide over the course of a decade. Most Jedi who were not around over thirty years ago to present day or were merely young children at the time were sheltered from it. The reason for doing so was in truth, fear--the masters and more veteran Knights of the time would argue it was to prevent fear on the padawans part, but the truth being it was on quite a few of their part as well. Which was Hervor's intention--in her eyes the Jedi had essentially become an obstacle to her and to what she loved, and thus wanted to make them suffer. It became her purpose to make them feel the same pain as she did, suffer loss as she had, be denied love as she had. The major events of the Sith Aristocrats forming and splitting away from the Republic also served proved as distraction for the Jedi to partly conceal issue of what Hervor was doing.

She targeted their younglings and padawans...

Having spent roughly a century as a Jedi and more so briefly having been an Archivist, she knew Jedi routines well. It was a simple matter for her to deduce varying Jedi traveling routes, and she then hunted them down. The Knights and Masters she never killed, what would be the point of that? If she killed them they would not experience the same pain as she did, they would not feel the same emptiness as she did of feeling through the Force those of whom they love dying a violent death and hearing them cry out in agony through the Force. A pain with no measure and no defense that Knights and Masters alike spend lifetimes coping with and never entirely successfully. A Force bond, after all, never goes away even when severed, for the pain from the emptiness that it leaves behind always remains.

But it was not just Jedi, it was Mandalorians as well. The insurgents were practically eradicated in the following years after Master Hjo's death, but it did not matter to Hervor in her rage. They were all lowly primates that needed population control. From a distance she observed the Republic's own monitoring of the Mandalorians' homeworlds occupied by the Republic. There were a few clans whose populations were each reduced to just a handful and each resided within their own little hamlets to preserve what they could of their clans culture. The second a stirring was rumored among the Mandalorians, one of those hamlets population went from several dozen to zero over night--men, women, and children in all. Only a few of the elderly remained, those who remembered her twenty years ago--knowing her to be Hervor, and relate that it was her who committed the crime. Three clans in all who were attempting to crawl out of becoming nearly extinct from the last war with the Republic, found themselves utterly purged over night because of Mandalorian stirrings over the years.

At this point the Republic wanted her removed because it was concerned with what she was doing would cause the Mandalorians to become more radicalized than they already were. The Jedi wanted her stopped for she was committing child murder on their younglings and padawans while isolated out in the galaxy with their masters. While the numbers of those slain were not relatively immense, per se, is not the point--nor was it ever, it was innocence being killed--that was the point.

The Jedi Shadows were sent out expressly to hunt for Hervor to stop her at long last, which she expected, but felt no need to hide from them any longer. She welcomed their confrontations. In the past she hid because she had a child to care for, but the Jedi and Mandalorians took that little girl away from her, and now she no longer felt any need to hide from them. The Jedi Masters she avoided, but when forced into a battle with them, she embraced it--some were easier than others but each was a hard fought struggle to engage nevertheless, some victories nearly cost her own life.

Over the course of several decades by this point, her engaging in lightsaber combat was something that held its own hindrance aside from having to cross a large distance to reach her opponents who were often well-armed with ranged weapons. Her body has many scars from having endured through numerous wounds received in many battles. What enabled her to endure much of the physical pain from the wounds she suffered was her immense talent in being able to re-enforce her body in a sense, and dull out the pain--minimizing it. Using the Force to enhance her endurance to such extremes she could push herself beyond the limits expected of most Jedi. While she feeds on pain to fuel herself in the dark side, this goes the extra mile in being able to physically endure it to continue to perform what would otherwise hinder her--perhaps even mortally. Leading to it being combined with her great ability for draining the lives of others a terrifying symbiosis.

But it was that experience from past battles suffered and endured through physically when facing several of those Jedi Masters that she fought to see her through the day more than once. The danger lay in taking the technique to its extremes rather than saving their life, it may start to drain away owns own life to maintain ones connection to the Force. However, the lethal symbiosis that Hervor utilizes this technique with her ability to drain the lives of others, so long as she has a target--she can use it to sustain her life as she utilizes the technique propel herself through wounds that could otherwise prove quite hindering. The combination of the two techniques was something she often exploited when facing Jedi Masters she fought, and a few times carried her through to the battles end narrowly with her life intact.

The Knights, she never killed, for they in time may have younglings or padawans as their ward and eventually love as if they were their own child; and that was when Hervor wanted to strike at them--strike at their most vulnerable. Some of the Knights were a struggle and worthy opponents, but by those years Hervor's strength in the dark side raw power and her ability to enhance her own physicality married with her mastery of her three forms of lightsaber combat--a chance for victory was not on their side. If they were lucky, she would leave them with only a missing limb.

Hervor whether she knew it or not, or even cared, in the years since the war with the Mandalorians ended had been caught in a continual cycle of vengeance. Reckoning was a perpetual source of motivation, and when coupled with an inner-justification for retribution--the war never ends. But it always changes, it escalates into new and more vile forms, what was once unheard of before--suddenly becomes a new standard when waging it.

There were times within the temple Xica clenched at her chest from the sudden sensation of unfathomable pain and rage--as if the darkness within Hervor reached out through their bond and gripped her heart. Constantly her Jedi Master peers and the Council would advise her to let go of her love and bond to Hervor, let it fade as it has caused her pain physically, mentally, and spiritually. But each time, Xica told them they just did not understand it: if it meant feeling pain or feeling nothing, she would choose pain every time. How one deals with pain shapes them: how one endures it, how one evades it, how one succumbs to it. Hervor succumbed to her pain. Jedi teachings often speak of letting go of it so it may vanish--a form of evasion. Xica chose not to succumb or evade it, so she could continue to feel and endure it. While the results of Xica's and Hervor's method of dealing with their pain were utterly different, their reasoning was identical.

More than anyone, Xica knew Hervor, and what to expect from her. She understood conflict only escalates, thus she knew Hervor's genocidal murders would only become more bold, something to make a statement to rock the core of those she was targeting. It dawned on Xica that among the current Council, only one had a padawan. How ethical Xica's next course of action was has often been a source of debate. What she did was simply follow that Council member and her padawan secretly. She never told or warned the Council member what she felt maybe directed her way. Xica just remained silent and waited--using them as bait for the monster she knew would eventually boldly strike.

It was not until nearly ten years after the death of Master Hjo that Xica's suspicions were proven right. No one expected Hervor to strike when and where she did, but that day a powerful darkness was felt by several masters. But the misjudgment of security with the belief that due to the Council member and her padawan going to the Senate building on Coruscant to meet with several senators over trade negotiations, the level of protection afforded to them would sufficient to make someone like Hervor hesitant, proved unsound. Xica knew it, it was always live or die for Hervor, and when she wants to make a statement, she makes it loud enough for many to feel it.

When the Council member's shuttle landed, security did not know what hit them. Before they understood what was going on the very essence of their lives was being drained out of them all at once. The ten elite security force officers assigned to greet the Jedi Master of the High Council and her padawan, had their very lives bleed away and drained of them through the Force's darkness within seconds. The Council member's eyes went wide as she saw the source of their deaths standing no more than forty meters from her; a being she had only her whispers and foreboding rumors about since she was young, and that figure marked physically by the corruption of the dark side, was undoutably Hervor. In her surprise the Council woman went for her lightsaber, but the tremendous speed of Hervor enabled to close the gap between them vastly more quickly than the Council woman was ever prepared for. Her lightsaber was drawn just soon enough to protect herself from Hervor's initial attack, but the following unrestrained, ruthless barrage of Juyo strikes overwhelmed her; and already caught by surprise, her back was already to the proverbial wall. It was only a few seconds later as Hervor kept the Council woman off-balance that the Jedi Master suddenly found her right arm removed at the shoulder as its hand still held onto her lightsaber.

Hervor wasted no time the second the Council woman was knocked to the ground upon her right arm being sliced off, the Dark Jedi Master begun using her vile talent for draining the very life itself from the Council woman's own padawan. Scarcely a teenager, the young padawan had no defense against the power and will of someone of Hervor's standing. The Council woman horrified by the turn of events could only think to use her talents in the Jedi healing arts sustain her padawan's life, while Hervor was draining it away. In a way it amused Hervor, because she was draining both of them away simultaneously, for as Hervor drained away the padawan's life through the Force it empowered her, but the Council woman was fading trying to keep her padawan alive. They both knew it, the Council woman could not keep this going, but if she did not--it meant the death of her padawan and Hervor's victory.

A flash of bright yellow light swang right at Hervor's head, though Hervor caught it barely by her peripheral, and deflected the flash of light away from her knowing it was the beam of a lightsaber. It was Xica facing Hervor stride for stride with every clash of their blades and with every exertion of power, Xica's light matching Hervor's darkness every step of the way. Once only second to Hune as the youngest member of the six Jedi Knights that followed Hervor to war, but now the Epicanthix was a Jedi Master whose strength matched the eighty year old Morellian fallen Jedi with equal measure in every way.

The Council woman used Xica's engaging Hervor to take herself and her padawan to safety. Meanwhile, Hervor and Xica fought a battle tougher than any they had ever fought before, not simply in terms of martial ability alone or power, but the two could see it in each others eyes--they still loved one another. The harder Hervor fought the more amazed she was by Xica's ability, and the strength of the light she felt within Xica was mesmerizing to her. In the quiet moments in the past, when reaching out through the bond she and Xica shared, she felt a warmth in it--something beautiful, but it was always so far away. Now in person, it was blinding and its warmth felt like bathing in gentle sunlight.

It did not matter how much faster one tried to move than the other, nor how much more tactical one tried to be over the other in their swordplay. Every shred of Hervor's immense raw power and strength was countered by Xica's incredible serene resilience and grace. Hervor was the stormy, thrashing chaotic waters destroying whatever was in the waters path, but Xica simply was the sturdy wall that the waters even with all their might could not break. In a way, though, Hervor did not want to break Xica, nor did Xica truly wish to stop the ebb and flow of the tides that composed Hervor. Neither wanted to do something that changed the other, or change what one loved about the other--they did not want to alter anything about the other. The reason was simple, one falling to the dark side can cause a Force bond to break, some manage to survive even if one is of the light and the other is darkness. Why that is, is do to the fall itself is not what severs the bond or causes it to erode away, but rather the event of the fall generally leads the two individuals stop being in-sync with one another. Despite Hervor's fall, she and Xica remained in-sync, because the two love another--they love what makes the other who they are and thus there bond continued to forge even as Hervor was falling to the dark side years ago.

Xica undoubtedly was disturbed by Hervor's atrocities, especially after the war with the Mandalorians. But nothing Hervor did was beyond what she expected Hervor to do if pushed to. Besides, if she condoned what Hervor was doing, she would not be fighting Hervor now. The key aspect being that she accepted Hervor for what she was, and conceded that what she was in love with was a monster--a monster that she believes has some level of humanity. The last leg of that humanity being Hervor's love for Xica herself, and it was her awareness and acceptance of this that kept her connected to Hervor, no matter how much pain it inflicted upon her. As she had said, if it was a choice between feeling pain and feeling nothing, she would choose pain every time.

For Hervor, Xica has become a representation of everything over the course of two centuries she had learned to hate with an immense vehemence. Yet, being denied love--the Jedi making her itself a constant obstacle to what she desires and needs, there was something she still narrowly clung to, and that was Xica--she could not lose what she felt for Xica. No matter how far she continued to dive into the abyss, no matter how many Jedi she faced out of her feelings of betrayal--she could never bring herself to hate Xica. She had known Xica for over twenty years, while they had only been together for six months during the Mandalorian's last crusade, their bond kept them intimately close to one another in spite of the physical distance between them. The Dark Jedi Master when she was still a padawan herself within the Order, one of the experienced padawans who tutored their younger peers and younglings, a handful she was close to and loved dearly and they were all killed in war, and then she experienced the same tragedy with Xica--she had been unfortunate enough not just see history repeat itself but directly experience it first hand. But unlike the first time, she had someone she loved endure with her, someone who experienced identically what she had and survived it with her. A bond like that cannot be measured with words alone.

The Force bond between the two never broke due to the two never giving up on the love the two felt for one another...

One could not defeat the other in this engagement for the simple fact while the two were on opposite sides of the spectrum, they contradictorily were in utter sync with one another and their bond remained strong by way of how powerfully they felt for one another. Their battle kept going on and on like endless dance set to music that would never stop.

With the swift flick of a wrist and flash of orange and the purposeful drop of a yellow beam of light done with a gentle smile. Hervor's eyes widened in dismay as she watched Xica fade away before her very eyes, and all that was left behind on the ground was her clothes and lightsaber left where she once stood. Xica was no more. With the fading away of Xica's being, so was her presence within Hervor, the bond that was there simply became emptiness. The veteran Laitra could only stand there frozen--what was only a few minutes felt like lifetimes to her. It did not seem real to her. All she could do was look down at what remained of the woman she loved: just Jedi garbs and a lightsaber. Everything else of Xica was simply gone.

Many had died with her, each of those she loved had died as results of her decisions, but none had died directly because of her actions alone... until now. In her quest for revenge she had inadvertently killed the only one she had any love in her heart left for, and by a vicious twist of irony her whole reason for taking on a path for vengeance was for the death of one she loved.

By the time the Jedi and more security arrived, Hervor was gone. The darkness that some of the Jedi Masters perceived to be her disappeared from the area within the day. Hervor had once again vanished.

The following years Hervor remained out of sight and off the Jedi's proverbial radar for the most part. There were scattered reports of someone of Hervor's likeness encountering other Dark Jedi, but nothing more than that. No one really knew what came of her. In time many who were around at the time begun to put her out their minds, and the holocron labelled "The Hervor Crisis" gained less and less of those updating it with reports on Hervor largely because sightings or leads that were or may have been her became so sparse. Only a few sightings, if that, within each passing decade at most.

During her solitude, Hervor felt she had nothing else other than the pain she felt from all the deaths of those she loved. Far too proud and strong-willed to ever consider the easy way out such as the weak's choice of suicide, there was still more Hervor wished to know and learn, she still had ambition to grow in power. More so her vengeance against the Jedi still burned within her heart, though she was not actively seeking them out any more. Xica's sacrifice to her pacified Hervor from choosing to go on another crusade, at least for a time. That crusade was about the death of her daughter, but Xica sacrificing herself upon Hervor's blade destroyed its purpose, for Hervor never wanted to kill Xica and in reality she would have preferred it be the other way around if it came to it; but they both knew neither could bring themselves to kill the other. So Xica made the choice for Hervor and disarmed herself allowing Hervor's blade to cut her down. It deprived all reason and motivation from Hervor to continue eliminating the Jedi's padawans and even the Mandalorians, out of a cause to break down the Jedi for being her obstacle to be with the one she loved.

Hervor never let go of the pain, as said before, if the choice were feeling pain or feeling nothing, she would choose to feel pain every time. In time Hervor begun to learn how to thrive on the pain, she loved and enjoyed it, for it meant to her that the love she felt for those dear to her who had passed on, she still loved. Her pain she clung to jealously and gladly.

Her day to day was partly martial and partly academic, she studied what she could and where she could find places she could research out of intellectual curiosity without the Jedi catching wind of her. And there was never a day where she was not training to further hone her ability with lightsaber combat and her power within the dark side. Really, her belief was correct for the most part in that she did not really have much left.

The dark side in that time she could more easily feel all around her, as with what has been taught in the old teachings it is everywhere--in everyone. Tapping into it, streaming its flow many dark side practitioners exert it as a electricity through their finger tips. As explained much earlier in the tale, she had learned to manipulate the current of that power to a far more potent variation of what is generally considered the standard, but rather as a storm surrounding oneself. Her attempts at this with Xica proved useless, however, the power of it cannot be denied. Nearly a two centuries of honing the technique those years it only grew more and more potent.

Thirty years since Xica's death this went on until--like several Dark Jedi Masters, she felt a shift within the Force--its flow had changed--a disturbance echoed. For those with the understanding for such things, they knew the shift to be subtle, but it was the sort of shift that once the change in currents starts flowing with the shift--it changes the face of everything. For those who had succumbed to the dark side, it was like a beacon, leading right to an ancient planet known well to the Jedi, Korriban, homeworld of the dead Sith. The call of Korriban has always been the call of the dead, and those who do not know that Hervor had always considered to be ignorant fools. For all things with the dark side ends in death, and has been something Hervor had accepted and embraced long ago.

What it was she felt, what they all felt who were drawn there, was the reforming of the Sith Order. The ideals of the Sith Order and its sought after vengeance coincided with Hervor's own with ease, and she meshed well with Sith Order's culture. Hervor never had to think about joining the Sith, it was just an obvious thing for her to do and so she did it.

The following months, Hervor primarily secluded herself to the archives of the Sith Temple, expanding upon what was lacking, and given how much was lost--there was quite a bit of work to keep her busy; though to be fair quite a bit had been excavated. Once again she returned to being what she was as a Jedi: an archivist. Given how few ever worked on its archives or even bothered to add to it outside of the excavations for Sith relics, it often lead her to being labelled 'The Archivist', as it seemed like she was the only one.

Also quite a few of the initiates while whispering among themselves call her, 'The Strange Creature', as she seldom interacts with anyone out of her seclusive nature containing herself to the Archives; while some rumor that she whispers to herself as if having a conversation with someone who is not even there. Though none seem brave enough to call her this label to her face or even anywhere near her presence.

Only a handful in the higher echelons actually know who she is, either because they were old enough to recall the atrocities she was causing in the past against the Jedi and Mandalorians; or from at least being old enough to have heard about her when the crisis she caused was still somewhat talked about. Or they knew of her, because she told them directly--though that occurrence is relegated to only one case. And she never did take on a "Sith name" for she preferred to keep her own, essentially heralding back to the ancient Sith, like Ludo Kressh, Aleema Keto, and Ulic Qel-Droma.

Albeit, in the past couple weeks, she has been making more and more of an appearance among the other Sith, rather than secluding herself to her studies within the Archives while also expanding upon the Sith archives themsevles. Though, her appearances have been largely to simply impart a lesson here or there to the initiates on channeling the dark side or honing ones own personal lightsaber style. With roughly three centuries of training in lightsaber combat and the Jedi's hand to hand combat style, and two centuries of honing her power to harness the dark side as well as enhancing her own physical prowess--she has much she can offer to teach those wise enough to be willing to learn and listen.

When a Jedi Shadow and Republic intelligence agent investigating the Sith spotted her among the Sith doing a bit of investigating of their own on Ambria (though with no real success in finding anything interesting or noteworthy beyond what was already known of the planet). The Jedi Shadow and Republic agent reported back to their superiors with holo-images of those they spotted. When it was reported that Hervor had surfaced once again, now among the Sith some interest in the dusty holocron labelled "The Hervor Crisis" was generated once again...

((Continued....))

[Apillis]

RP Sample:

"Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of withering, of tarnishing." ~ Anais Nin

The Hervor Crisis: Xica and Hervor

The swift brilliant blade of yellow light only ever so narrowly was deflected away from laying claim to Hervor's neck as she redirected it away from her with the orange beam of her own blade of light. Taking the opportunity while Hervor was distracted, the Jedi Master of the High Council who had her arm cut off at the shoulder by Hervor in an earlier engagement, scrambled to her feet and gathered up her padawan to escape the shuttle pad of the Senate building with their lives. The exodus of her quarry Hervor did not pay any mind to, nor did she really seem to care by comparison to whom was before her now and was clashing blades with...

"Xica...", Hervor murmurred in her surprise as their blades of light clashed one against the other in dazzling display of skill and prowess.

There was a faint smile upon the Jedi Master, the smile of a woman who sees the one they love and have wanted to see for years--only to see them in a circumstance neither party would rather find themselves in, "Hervor."

There was much one wanted to say to the other, but as they fought, the more intense their struggle became. With each action against the other they found their words to be unnecessary for every moment they attempted to utter them. Their bond they could feel over great distances, across thousands upon thousands of stars even, and now in person after twenty years had come and gone standing before one another fighting in a battle that will decide the life and death of the other--that bond was more intense than it had ever been in the past. They felt the thoughts of the other, the feelings of the other, hopes and fears of one another, the pain both were under the weight of, and how dearly one still loved the other. Words were superfluous in this moment, and likely the last moment they will ever have together.

The life Xica lead after the war with the Mandalorians twenty years ago was spent as an atoner, she knew she had done them wrong--she made no excuses for her actions nor attempted to argue them as justified, merely only ever stated why she chose to do them. While her contrition for them was recognizing she had done wrong. She regretted ever having done them, yet--if it came to it, she would follow Hervor into war again as she had in the past. When a war is remembered most tend to only look back at the evil that was caused, but forget the cause itself, and ignore or simply fail to comprehend the why of those who chose to go to war. For Xica the why had always been Hervor herself. In the years after shouldering her own pain as well as what pain she felt through her bond to Hervor, Xica chose to shoulder that pain as well--accept it for what it was and take on that at least a little bit of burden that she could feel through her bond, for the one she loved.

Acceptance--a willingness to shoulder anothers burdens, remorse married with a desire to atone for past wrongs and sins--not out of attrition: fearing of being damned. But the genuine need to right a wrong. Her life since the war was filled with many good works. An ethical person knows the difference between right and wrong, but a moral one will actually not do that wrong or try to right it because of recognizing that it is wrong. Xica spent her entire life seeking to make up for the blood that was unnecessarily shed. Atonement--genuine atonement, is not something always fully comprehended by many, it is a cleansing--reaching a point of clarity that one never stops atoning for lives lost. She spent years surrounded in darkness of the pain caused by regret of past sins, only to learn how to accept it all willingly to soothe and pacify it--turning darkness into shining light.

Hervor was blinded by the light she could see and feel shining from her--it was radiant as if standing in direct sunlight--soft, gentle--warm. A brilliance she had never felt from another Jedi, not even Master Hjo, there was a purity within Xica's presence that held a complete repose that utterly withstood everything that composed Hervor's opposition to the Jedi, to equanimity... to the light. The very shear darkness of her presence that Hervor had used to overwhelm the Jedi she had faced in the past was unravelling--fading away the moment it approached the luminosity of Xica's light. There was no overpowering Xica with darkness, for how she molded herself over the years to be the perfect foil to Hervor to repel all that would be brought forth in a confrontation with her.

Even unleashing a massive array of lightning that nearly covered the entire shuttle pad Hervor directed at Xica, it was all simply absorbed into the palm of left hand as if accepting all the rage and hate Hervor felt toward the Jedi. No matter how much wrath Hervor had to unbridle it was simply accepted willingly by Xica, every time she took on Hervor's burden. The years of sought after peace Xica possessed disarmed every bit of the crushing pain turned into fury and madness for power that Hervor had to offer. But Hervor did not fully understand why as they fought--at least in the beginning. There was no intention of Xica attempting to defeat Hervor--at least to a lethal extent, it was just accepting all of what Hervor exerted. And Hervor knew it--felt it, it was Xica every time saying through the actions and clashing of blades and resilience of withstanding Hervor's hatred, that she was willing to shoulder Hervor's affliction--her pain. Why? Love. How? Acceptance.

What lended to Hervor's power was a philosophy of opposition, what was lending to Xica's resilience--what empowered her to continue to take on Hervor's darkness was acceptance--a philosophy of acceptance. The two were opposites, where they drew their strength and power were utterly different, but in that difference--they were two sides of the same coin, they were in perfect sync with one another. Every motion, every step, and emotion felt for one another was matched by the other in perfect symbiosis. In the chaos where the dark meets light, they found the rhythm to where they can dance in seamless harmony to the point where the shadows of Hervor's darkness begun and the brilliance of Xica's light ended became blurred as the two swirled together in unimpeded kinesis.

It left Hervor taken aback by how much Xica had changed in her ability and countenance over the years. After the war with the Mandalorians, it broke her heart to watch the hopefulness in Xica's eyes drain away into sorrow and sought after repentance, and there they remained. But something about that disposition Xica managed to manifest into something else. With every bit of aggression that Hervor assailed her with, Xica meet with the pacifism of acceptance--pacificism... passive.

Where Xica learned to accept the darkness and turn it into light to repel everything that Hervor had to offer. It was from Master Hjo's teachings of 'passive-aggression', but like Hervor, she took the philosophy and methodology of Master Hjo's and made it into something else--made it her own. Hervor utilized Master Hjo's teachings as the foundation for a philosophy designed to break down and cow the opposition; Xica utilized Master Hjo's teachings as the foundation for a philosophy designed to absorb and negate the opposition's aggression. Martially Hervor found herself completely nullified.

She begun to see it in Xica's movements, the blending of Djem So and Ataru, but there was something she did not recognize--there was no aggression in it--at least, not with the bold, ferocity which primarily came from Juyo--that was utterly absent in Xica's flow and finesse with her blade. Though she recalled, Xica's favored form was Soresu, and that was what she utilized as the bridge point between Djem So and Ataru, just as Hervor and Master Hjo utilized Juyo for the same. With such a style, she had just enough offense and agility to keep Hervor on her toes, while possessing all of the grace and tact defensively to seemingly cancel out each of Hervor's swift, wrathful strikes.

But this would be a dance that would never end in a way, they were locked within a struggle that neither wanted the other dead or brought to harm, stopped--certainly, yet no more than that. Albeit, with how the conflicts have escalated themselves it was just an impossibility, and they both knew it. So on and on, they fought trying to find a way to stop the other without truly defeating one another, but in the eyes of both it was understood it was a battle that had to be fought--their perspectives and philosophies demanded it of them. It was a battle with set to motion that continually stayed in motion, something had to be the wall to stop it from progessing lest it continued to escalate to extents neither wanted to take it.

Before Hervor even realized it, Xica made the choice to end it. With a flash of a brilliant orange beamed blade like that of a setting sun, the fallen Jedi's eyes widened with the sudden realization of the yellow beam of Xica's blade perfectly poised to remove Hervor's right arm at the elbow ending the battle. By a true master of Soresu, Hervor found herself trapped in her own offense. Yet that yellow beamed blade of light fell to the ground, it was simply let go of as Hervor's blade slashed across Xica's chest. But there was no burn, no harm--nothing--Xica simply faded away into air--into the ethereal before Hervor's very eyes. Last thing she saw of Xica was just the soft, loving smile of someone who willingly gave up their life for the one they loved with no regrets. All there was of Xica upon the ground were the clothes Xica was wearing and her lightsaber, nothing else. She did what only the greatest masters of the Force could do, not simply joining the Force upon death but becoming one with it.

Xica had Hervor dead to rights at the end of their confrontation, she had Hervor's defeat in her very grasp--yet, she gave it up to save Hervor from herself--stopping her from continuing her crusade, for with Xica's sacrifice that crusade against the Jedi lost all its meaning. Killing when done righteously Hervor felt to be a chore like any other, when the cause was right, and she killed numerous in what she thought to be her righteous indignation against the Jedi for the death of a little girl she loved with all her heart. But in that crusade having killed the last person she loved by her own hand, the purpose of that crusade was obliterated. Yet again, in her confrontation with Xica, she had negated Hervor's actions... even in death.

It was not lost on Hervor, the entire event while it was only a few minutes in total--felt like a lifetime, and the couple minutes spent after Xica's death as she stood there frozen in dismay at what had just happened felt like countless lifetimes going by. Hervor in that moment also learned what it meant to face a true Jedi, one who understood what it meant to engage in conflict and how to give it up; one who understood the Jedi Code and how to live and die by the reality of its simplicity. Hervor had long given up on any notion of salvation long ago and cast aside all remorse in years that have past and been forgotten, but in this case... she mourned the loss of Xica, and saw the galaxy as being lesser without her presence. The pain left from the void of Xica's presence in her heart, Hervor clung to--if it means feeling pain or feeling nothing... she chose pain...

[Cain]

My apologies for the wait, Apillis. Without further delay, deep breath, let's go.

First, your bio:

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

As stated her battle in protecting the farmers, it gained her Knighthood at long last.

One battle isn't really enough to justify being named a Jedi Knight. Certainly this would be a fine Trial of Courage, but I'm not sure the Jedi would elevate her on this alone. But I also don't think it matters. Though you don't go into the specific details, I imagine Hervor's entire experience through the war is more than enough to merit Knighthood (Skill in combat, flesh losing her beloved friends, spirit in coming to terms with her own darkness). Certainly the Jedi would not recognize her after falling, but she doesn't need to be Knighted by the Jedi to reach "Knight level", which I think she does in fighting the war. I'd consider just leaving her as a Padawan so far as the Jedi are concerned, and being recognized as a Knight in the eyes of her comrades rather than forcing her Knighthood in just before the war.

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

But in that moment, what the two Jedi Shadows saw did not register within their minds for a trice. It was Hervor standing right in front of Master Hjo, but she moved with such tremendous speed, they did not see it at first. Master Hjo himself stood limp, while Hervor looked as though she swung a punch and stopped. But the sight itself did not quite make sense at first. Albeit it only took that trice for it finally dawn them why it did not make sense, and why they could not see her right hand--as it was lodged wrist deep in Master Hjo's head--through his face. All before he could utter a word to her. Hervor did not want to hear it. His body flopped to the ground at her feet the moment she removed her right hand from inside his skull.

I have a couple of concerns about this:

• For starters, I'm not sure it's physically possible to punch through someone's skull. Shatter it, maybe. Lodging a fist wrist deep into his head, however, is over the top.
  
• Also, I'm curious as to how a Master so skilled as Hjo, who completely dominated Hervor moments ago, could be so completely unprepared for an attack when this woman is clearly seething with the dark side, and thus done in by a punch to the face. Even if he hadn't recognized her change from despair to aggression, it doesn't make sense that he would suddenly let his guard down.
  

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Lightsabers re-ignited as the two Jedi Shadows charged right for Hervor, but before they could reach her as they pulled back their blades to strike her down, for the air around Hervor grew dense. It was the dark side, formulated into a palpable energy by raw hate, and unleashed in a series of waves that blew the two Jedi Shadows away from her. It is an ancient technique known to Dark Jedi, Sith and fallen Force Adepts, not wrought from knowledge--but something primal deep within--much like the technique known as Force Scream, it is technically not a learned technique itself but something instinctually pulled out of the depths of oneself and unleashed. What Hervor did ancient practitioners of the Force have simply called 'Hatred', turning ones own hate into raw energy wrought from the dark side to repel assailants.

Basically this is a pseudo Force Repulse that activates by itself. While I recognize that this sort of power does occur in canon (see Darth Bane), it's not something I feel like Hervor should be able to use to circumvent her weak telekinesis stat. As something triggered by a unique moment or raw hatred, it makes sense for the bio, but it's not something you should be doing while RPing with this character.

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

The strength of her ability to drain life from others as well as the magnitude to which she could channel the power of the dark side in the form of lightning from her fingertips she had spent years honing, since her battles with the Mandalorians; and with time her talent at doing so only grew.

I do like to be shown these sorts of things, rather than just told. Now I'm not asking for an obligatory scene of Hervor meditating and using the Force on straw dummies before moving up to sentient beings. What I do want to see when it concerns specialized skills is the evolution of a power from the beginnings of its use to its mastery. First introducing an ability by having a character use it flawlessly followed by a single sentence of exposition assuring me that they've trained for years is generally frowned upon. This is the first time you've really mentioned all three of your specialized powers, and she's using each of them like a pro. I want to see more. Introduce the beginnings of these abilities earlier in the bio. There are plenty of opportunities for you to do so with what you already have.

And finally, the stats:

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Practiced Lightsaber forms:

Shii-Cho - 5
Makashi - N/A
Soresu - N/A
Ataru - 5
Djem So - 5
Niman - N/A
Juyo - 5
Double Bladed Combat - N/A

Looks fine.

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Force-Sensitive Abilities or practices:

Telekinetic: 3
Telepathic: 3
Body: 8
Sense: 5
Protection: 2
Healing: 0
Destruction: 9

The numbers themselves aren't an issue here, though I'm not convinced your bio fully merits the 9 in Destruction as of yet. I've stated the reasons above. I want to see more of her growth in the use of lightning, drain, and rage. Also, overall Hervor is weaker than most in the use of the Force, as these stats indicate. I feel you should have more in your bio to suggest that.

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Attributes:

Physical Strength: 5
Intelligence: 7
Speed: 8
Leadership: 2

Unarmed: 8 (Limited to Broken Gate)
Melee Weapons: 2
Ranged Weapons: 1

An 8 in speed is awfully high, especially considering there is nothing biologically that should give a Morellian an advantage in this area over a human. While you do write her as being fast, much of that has more to do with the Force than natural speed, so I'll suggest a 7 for that stat.

And, exhale! Overall, considering the size of the bio I don't have many criticisms. It was a good read and I really enjoyed the attention you paid to Hervor's fall to the dark side, portraying it as a steady decline into an unending cycle of vengeance rather than simply flipping the angry switch. Very well done.

[Apillis]

May 12, 2012 14:42:34 GMT -5 Cain said:

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

As stated her battle in protecting the farmers, it gained her Knighthood at long last.

One battle isn't really enough to justify being named a Jedi Knight. Certainly this would be a fine Trial of Courage, but I'm not sure the Jedi would elevate her on this alone. But I also don't think it matters. Though you don't go into the specific details, I imagine Hervor's entire experience through the war is more than enough to merit Knighthood (Skill in combat, flesh losing her beloved friends, spirit in coming to terms with her own darkness). Certainly the Jedi would not recognize her after falling, but she doesn't need to be Knighted by the Jedi to reach "Knight level", which I think she does in fighting the war. I'd consider just leaving her as a Padawan so far as the Jedi are concerned, and being recognized as a Knight in the eyes of her comrades rather than forcing her Knighthood in just before the war.

Well, one battle can encompass the entirety of the Jedi trials, a classic example being Obi-Wan's fight with Maul. Basically the idea was the loss of those villagers she cared for over the course of the years she had visited them being flesh; not falling to the dark side from experiencing all that loss being spirit; fighting the battle itself on her own against the Mandalorians being courage; and her skill be shown in being able to fight and help the village fend off their attackers, despite suffering losses (which is to be expected). Albeit, you are right in that I just kinda slipped in there to have her Knighted before going off to war. So, in the end, I just went with your suggestion.

May 12, 2012 14:42:34 GMT -5 Cain said:

I have a couple of concerns about this:

• For starters, I'm not sure it's physically possible to punch through someone's skull. Shatter it, maybe. Lodging a fist wrist deep into his head, however, is over the top.
  
• Also, I'm curious as to how a Master so skilled as Hjo, who completely dominated Hervor moments ago, could be so completely unprepared for an attack when this woman is clearly seething with the dark side, and thus done in by a punch to the face. Even if he hadn't recognized her change from despair to aggression, it doesn't make sense that he would suddenly let his guard down.
  

Hahaha. Yeah, I'll just be honest here, it just amused the hell out of me the idea of her punching through his skull, and I completely ripped it off from the intro of the game Shadow Hearts. In any case, it's been changed.

However, one thing that gets under my skin is the idea that because a character has a lot of ability and power, they cannot fall victim to their own hubris. And that's what happened to Hjo. It's all there. He felt guilty, he lowered his guard in attempt to reason with her. Because if you're trying to reason with someone to resolve something peacefully--looking like you're ready to fight them--your words aren't going to come off as very sincere; especially to a pissed off, paranoid dark sider expecting damn near anyone to knife them in the back (it's just how they are in general).

In the end, he made an error in judgment out of guilt, and before even had the chance to try to reason with her--boom--she killed him with a cheap shot. As the old saying goes, "Even the best swordsman in the world can die to a hidden dagger.", Master Hjo's ability was great, but he's not a god, he's still "human", and thus was killed by a sucker punch (albeit, a very, very strong Dark Rage fueled sucker punch). Thus proving in the end, his encroaching death that he and others sensed mentioned several times in the narrative was not his old age, but rather his hubris in regards to Hervor. Though, that bit, I didn't write in there, because I was hoping the reader would pick up on themselves. XD

May 12, 2012 14:42:34 GMT -5 Cain said:

Basically this is a pseudo Force Repulse that activates by itself. While I recognize that this sort of power does occur in canon (see Darth Bane), it's not something I feel like Hervor should be able to use to circumvent her weak telekinesis stat. As something triggered by a unique moment or raw hatred, it makes sense for the bio, but it's not something you should be doing while RPing with this character.

Haha. Yeah, I know, it's an ability I remember reading back in the mid-90s from Tales of the Jedi comics, only the few times they used it, it didn't have a name on those days. But it's something that I've used in narratives a couple of times for dramatic effect, and I just thought it worked as a unique circimstance for that particular part of the narrative alone. If I really wanted her doing uber shiz like that left and right, I would have just made her a clone of Acalya (whom I killed off). XD

May 12, 2012 14:42:34 GMT -5 Cain said:

I do like to be shown these sorts of things, rather than just told. Now I'm not asking for an obligatory scene of Hervor meditating and using the Force on straw dummies before moving up to sentient beings. What I do want to see when it concerns specialized skills is the evolution of a power from the beginnings of its use to its mastery. First introducing an ability by having a character use it flawlessly followed by a single sentence of exposition assuring me that they've trained for years is generally frowned upon. This is the first time you've really mentioned all three of your specialized powers, and she's using each of them like a pro. I want to see more. Introduce the beginnings of these abilities earlier in the bio. There are plenty of opportunities for you to do so with what you already have.

This surprised me, because I had actually been explaining her progressive usage of the dark side since her first fighting the Mandalorians as well as her starting to use drain and dark rage. The lightning bit I was a bit light on so I tried to remedy, and I also added the Force Body technique to the list as well, and of course expanded on her learning and usage of it. I honestly kinda' hate writing "So she used Death Field!" or "She begun training in Force Storm!", I like to describe the abilities and their functions and how she learned them instead, because otherwise it just reads like a DnD session minus the dice rolls. I want it to read and sound like a story not a PnP (or video) game.

But, so you don't have to go back and read over the massive walls of text, I'll quote the shiz here (warning it will not be in chronological order):

Original stuffs for learning to Force Drain/Lightning to Death Field/Force Storm:

What were Hervor's holocrons within the Jedi Archives on? Empowerment. Empowerment within battle and warfare. They were meticulous, indepth accounts and explanations about how to draw--not simply channel--but literally draw upon the strength of both enemies and allies alike to propel oneself forward with greater strength. Not in any symbolic method of empowerment, but more literal in the sense of syphoning strength--the Force--even life from them. It was dangerously similar to the Sith/Dark Jedi method of drawing power from others, which dealt with severing and/or interrupting connections of life to the Force to draw them inward into oneself to recover from depleting strength and heal ones wounds. Hervor’s method was a bit different but eerily similar, her method had nothing to do with severing or interrupting connections (nor healing ones wounds... at least not yet), it was not to stop the flow within life, but rather redirect part of that flow of life--the Force into oneself. It was but a mere step away from the horrid methods of what powerful Sith/Dark Jedi utilized to rob the very lives of others for their own gains through the Force via the dark side.

...He only screamed more in pain as his very life was agonizingly being torn from him, draining away through Hervor's revitalized strength within the dark side.

His companion rose to his feet. When the Jedi Shadow saw what was happening to his friend, he sprang into action. But with her free hand, Hervor unleashed at an astounding magnitude a stream of lightning from her fingertips. He had seen and faced fallen Jedi, even those who had not fallen, utilize Force Lightning before--but not like this--and not with the kind of power he was experiencing now. The very life of the Jedi Shadow that Hervor was draining away within her grip, she was using that energy--his lifeforce to fuel the lightning she was exerting through her fingertips that was now completely torturing and burning his companion. The strength of her ability to drain life from others as well as the magnitude to which she could channel the power of the dark side in the form of lightning from her fingertips she had spent years honing, since her battles with the Mandalorians; and with time her talent at doing so only grew.

...Tapping into it, streaming its flow many dark side practitioners exert it as a electricity through their finger tips. As explained much earlier in the tale, since fighting the pair of Jedi Shadows that were with Master Hjo (and even several years before that), she had learned to manipulate the current of that power to a far more potent variation of what is generally considered the standard, but rather as a storm surrounding oneself. Her attempts at this with Xica proved useless, however, though the power of it cannot be denied. Nearly a half-century of honing the technique those years it only grew more and more potent.

New additions to that:

As mentioned before, and mused by Master Hjo, do to her large focus on lightsaber combat, her ability to fight from a distance was lacking. Mandalorians primarily all fight at range with a wide arsenal of weaponry, and a lightsaber alone is not always the best for to dealing with this. But she learned over the years since her fall--drawing from literal strength from of those within her proximity she could fuel herself, and more so channel that energy for unleashing greater power. The further she fell she simply took it to its next most logical extreme, rather than simply drawing power from anothers strength--she simply drained it all from their very life--severing the connection between the victim(s) and the Force to continue to fuel her own power with their very lives.

Draining power from the very lives of others to fuel oneself, lead her to further channel that power through herself in a variety of ways. Many times she used it to furthe propel herself in combat, other times exert as raw dark energy--summoning forth powerful bolts of lightning from her fingertips. The latter wound up being something she utilized exceedingly often in conjunction with her talent for draining life from others, and thereby using her victim(s) life (lives) to amplify the power and even the enormity of the lightning she is unleashing. With time eventually the extent and power she learns to harness the dark side with, and her ability at draining lives and unleashing dark side power in the form of lightning is great enough where to to combine to the two as she is with two Jedi Shadows, would be considered as nothing shy of extreme overkill to even Sith standards.

Force Body w/ Force Drain and Death Field:

Over the course of several decades by this point, her engaging in lightsaber combat was something that held its own hinderance aside from having to cross a large distance to reach her opponents who were often well-armed with ranged weapons. Her body has many scars from having endured through numerous wounds received in many battles. What enabled her to endure much of the physical pain from the wounds she suffered was her immense talent in being able to re-enforce her body in a sense, and dull out the pain--minimizing it. Using the Force to enhance her endurance to such extremes she could push herself beyond the limits expected of most Jedi. While she feeds on pain to fuel herself in the dark side, this goes the extra mile in being able to physically endure it to continue to perform what would otherwise hinder her--perhaps even mortally. Leading to it being combined with her great ability for draining the lives of others a terrifying symbiosis.

But it was that experience from past battles suffered and endured through physical when facing several of those Jedi Masters that she fought to see her through the day more than once. The danger lay in taking the technique too its extremes rather than saving their life, it may start to drain away owns own life to maintain ones connection to the Force. However, the lethal symbiosis that Hervor utilizes this technique with her ability to drain the lives of others, so long as she has a target--she can use it to sustain her life as she utilizes the technique propel herself through wounds that could otherwise prove quite hindering. The combination of the two techniques was something she often exploited when facing Jedi Masters she fought, and a few times carried her through to the battles end narrowly with her life intact.

May 12, 2012 14:42:34 GMT -5 Cain said:

The numbers themselves aren't an issue here, though I'm not convinced your bio fully merits the 9 in Destruction as of yet. I've stated the reasons above. I want to see more of her growth in the use of lightning, drain, and rage. Also, overall Hervor is weaker than most in the use of the Force, as these stats indicate. I feel you should have more in your bio to suggest that.

There are numerous areas where I've written she's consistantly using the dark side to strengthen herself, and continuously using dark rage when facing her opposition. It in fact rarely goes without a mention any time I'm writing about Hervor directly in the last half-century of her life within the narrative most times. And that's not even getting into what I have for the particular specialities she has which also involve using the dark side. So I'm not exactly certain what more you're asking for. I kinda' need you to clarify that for me.

And it wasn't my intention for her to appear weak in the Force, in fact, it was my intention to display that she's strong in the Force, it's simply she focused largely on a lightsaber combative role (while focusing heavily on using dark side power to do so) rather than wielding the Force with flashy stuffs like telekinesis. Because, it requires one to utilize the Force in the first place to do those lightsaber forms, especially the forms Ataru and Juyo. So, to exclaim that a little more sharply I upped her Telepathy to a 4, and her Sense to 7. The 7 in Sense I wove into the foreboding she was sensing over her daughter, and so you don't have to go digging around through the massive wall of text for that addition I wove into that part, I'll quote it here:

Hervor had always possessed a talent for perceiving through the Force. After all, it was always crucial in lightsaber combat to feel out ones opponents weaknesses through the Force to exploit them to either defeat them quickly, break them down, and/or kill them. The latter two was something Hervor often revelled in doing, feeling her opponent's insecurities, their fears--where the greatest flaw in their technique lie, what they were feeling in that moment. Then with her honed rage through the Force stuck at it either with blade or the very raw power of the dark side.

However, what she perceived within Force was only causing her own torment, and was breaking her down in a panic. What she felt was nothing but a foreboding danger--the perception terrorized her as she scrambled to return home. An irony in a way that she once used her keen perceptions through the Force to terrorize her opponents, but now her perceptions were terrorizing her...

((Edit: Fix'd typoes and whatnot... probably more still there. <.<))

[Cain]

May 30, 2012 2:31:50 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Well, one battle can encompass the entirety of the Jedi trials, a classic example being Obi-Wan's fight with Maul. Basically the idea was the loss of those villagers she cared for over the course of the years she had visited them being flesh; not falling to the dark side from experiencing all that loss being spirit; fighting the battle itself on her own against the Mandalorians being courage; and her skill be shown in being able to fight and help the village fend off their attackers, despite suffering losses (which is to be expected). Albeit, you are right in that I just kinda slipped in there to have her Knighted before going off to war. So, in the end, I just went with your suggestion.

xD Alright then.

May 30, 2012 2:31:50 GMT -5 Apillis said:

However, one thing that gets under my skin is the idea that because a character has a lot of ability and power, they cannot fall victim to their own hubris. And that's what happened to Hjo. It's all there. He felt guilty, he lowered his guard in attempt to reason with her. Because if you're trying to reason with someone to resolve something peacefully--looking like you're ready to fight them--your words aren't going to come off as very sincere; especially to a pissed off, paranoid dark sider expecting damn near anyone to knife them in the back (it's just how they are in general).

I do agree with your premise that even very powerful individuals can become arrogant, or over emotional and thus open themselves up to attack. However, to me, this didn't seem to be that situation. Hjo had just fought with her, he knew she was dangerous and as a Master probably should've anticipated that her emotions would only make her more unstable. This is why I find it strange that he'd be caught completely unprepared. Perhaps if it were written to suggest that he was prepared for her attack, just not quite the amount of power she threw at him.

May 30, 2012 2:31:50 GMT -5 Apillis said:

But, so you don't have to go back and read over the massive walls of text, I'll quote the shiz here (warning it will not be in chronological order):

The additions look good, though while we're on the subject of specialized skills, you don't need to list Broken Gate or Force Storm. You have potent Force Lightning. Your destruction stat will let us know that.

May 30, 2012 2:31:50 GMT -5 Apillis said:

There are numerous areas where I've written she's consistantly using the dark side to strengthen herself, and continuously using dark rage when facing her opposition. It in fact rarely goes without a mention any time I'm writing about Hervor directly in the last half-century of her life within the narrative most times. And that's not even getting into what I have for the particular specialities she has which also involve using the dark side. So I'm not exactly certain what more you're asking for. I kinda' need you to clarify that for me.

As I said, I wanted to see more about her growth in using the specialized skills you listed, pre-Nar Shaddaa. This is already taken care of, at least as far as Destruction is concerned.

May 30, 2012 2:31:50 GMT -5 Apillis said:

And it wasn't my intention for her to appear weak in the Force, in fact, it was my intention to display that she's strong in the Force, it's simply she focused largely on a lightsaber combative role (while focusing heavily on using dark side power to do so) rather than wielding the Force with flashy stuffs like telekinesis. Because, it requires one to utilize the Force in the first place to do those lightsaber forms, especially the forms Ataru and Juyo. So, to exclaim that a little more sharply I upped her Telepathy to a 4, and her Sense to 7. The 7 in Sense I wove into the foreboding she was sensing over her daughter, and so you don't have to go digging around through the massive wall of text for that addition I wove into that part, I'll quote it here

Hervor is a Marauder. This intrinsically implies that your character's focus is lightsaber combat over use of the Force. Let's keep that in mind. If you had not intended your character to appear weak in the Force, then you've certainly succeeded. If your intention was to focus Hervor on lightsaber wielding rather than "flashy stuff", then you've failed. Hervor is about as powerful as they come in both areas. Your stats were already high before. Upping them to what you now have, along with two specialized skills is asking a lot for a Marauder. Too much actually. Bottom line, if you want a 9 in destruction you're going to need to sacrifice in other areas.

[Apillis]

I see what you were saying now. It was a disconnect I was having. Anytime when someone tells me that a lightsaber duelist is "weak in the Force", I double-take, given every great lightsaber duelist has always been very strong in the Force, because hell, just to master the forms one has to be strong with the Force to achieve their pinnacle as it takes the Force to be able to do them. So, when I was being told that she's weak in the Force because of being a lightsaber duelist, I was like, "Well, hell, I guess I have to compensate in some way to show that she isn't.", When really, it's not that she's weak in the Force, it's more along the lines of she simply "allocated her strength in the Force into a combative skill set" rather than Telekinesis, Telepathy, Protection, Healing, blah blah... It was just my anal SW nerdery getting the better of me.

Anyhoo', the 3 points I had added in Force shiz, I subtracted 2 of them, leaving her Sense at 6 now, because it just makes sense to me that a lightsaber duelist has sharp perceptions in the Force. But, if you want it docked back down to 5, eh--you won't hear any complaining from me, I'm not married to it. XD

And I expanded upon and hammed up a bit Master Hjo's guilt leading to his death, and all that good stuff. XD

[Cain]

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Specialized Skills:
Death Field
Force Body
Force Storm

Again... you don't need Force Storm here. Force Storm is a banned power, and it's not what Hervor uses. Hervor uses Force Lightning. A powerful variation of Force Lightning, yes, but we still just call it Lightning, and it doesn't need to be listed here.

Apr 15, 2012 22:25:41 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Attributes:

Physical Strength: 5
Intelligence: 7
Speed: 7
Leadership: 4

Forgive me for only just noticing this now, but it seems to me that Hervor should have at least a 6 in Leadership. You don't invoke the kind of devotion from followers that she did by being a below average leader.

Jun 2, 2012 3:41:11 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Anyhoo', the 3 points I had added in Force shiz, I subtracted 2 of them, leaving her Sense at 6 now, because it just makes sense to me that a lightsaber duelist has sharp perceptions in the Force. But, if you want it docked back down to 5, eh--you won't hear any complaining from me, I'm not married to it. XD

Yes, a 5 would be much preferred. I could accept those stats.

Normally I would also ask to see some recognition in the bio of her weaknesses in the Force (say being overpowered by telekinesis, or harmed by telepathy for example). However, I believe I can trust you to role play your character's weaknesses properly.

Jun 2, 2012 3:41:11 GMT -5 Apillis said:

And I expanded upon and hammed up a bit Master Hjo's guilt leading to his death, and all that good stuff. XD

Still seems strange to me that he'd let himself get that emotional, but I can live with what's there now.

So, almost there! Just a few more minor adjustments and I think you're set.

[Apillis]

Okie doke, altered stats as told to. ;D

But, the Force Storm, only the Wormhole variety is what's banned. The powerful form of Force Lightning that's known as Force Storm is allowed going by the powers list (it's coupled with Chain Lightning).

[Cain]

Jun 2, 2012 16:52:19 GMT -5 Apillis said:

Okie doke, altered stats as told to. ;D

But, the Force Storm, only the Wormhole variety is what's banned. The powerful form of Force Lightning that's known as Force Storm is allowed going by the powers list (it's coupled with Chain Lightning).

Ah yes, you're right. I hadn't realized they clumped it in there with Chain Lightning. Well with that cleared up, there's nothing left to do but to approve.
May the Force serve you well.

Approved Stats:

Practiced Lightsaber forms:

Shii-Cho - 5
Makashi - N/A
Soresu - N/A
Ataru - 5
Djem So - 5
Niman - N/A
Juyo - 5
Double Bladed Combat - N/A

Force-Sensitive Abilities or practices:

Telekinetic: 3
Telepathic: 3
Body: 8
Sense: 5
Protection: 2
Healing: 0
Destruction: 9

Specialized Skills:
Death Field
Force Body
Force Storm (potent variation of Force Lightning)

Attributes:

Physical Strength: 5
Intelligence: 7
Speed: 7
Leadership: 6

Unarmed: 8 (Limited to Broken Gate)
Melee Weapons: 2
Ranged Weapons: 1

[Apillis]

Added another appearance pic w/ a link to two additional images of Hervor. Nothing else was added or changed or altered or etc etc etc etc, everything else is as it has been.

[Dutch]

Edits Approved

[Dutch]

App Update 2015 edits Approved

Equipment:
Lightsaber: Tyrfing - A lightsaber that looks like it was assembled from a standard lightsaber duelist's hilt and that of an old worn electrum lightsaber hilt of an honored Jedi Master, and the two blended together into one hilt--as if one was used to supplement parts to repair the other; though it is difficult to tell which was utilized to repair the other. When ignited the blade is an intense fiery orange hue.

Stats:

Strength - Below Average
Agility - Superior
Intelligence - Above Average
Charisma - Above Average

Force Stats:

Telekinetic- Apprentice
Telepathic- Apprentice
Body- Master
Sense- Adept
Protection- Novice
Healing– Unskilled
Destruction– Master

Combat Training:
Mixed Martial Arts (including Broken Gate) - Expert
Small Arms (Firearms) - Novice

Force Training:
Death Field - Expert
Force Body - Master
Force Storm - Expert

Other Training:
Piloting - Apprentice
Galactic Lore - Adept
Force Lore - Expert
Military History - Adept
Archiving - Expert

Lightsaber Training:

Shii-Cho- Master
Makashi- Untrained
Soresu- Untrained
Ataru- Master
Djem So- Master
Niman- Untrained
Juyo- Master
Double Bladed Combat- Untrained

[Neology]

Moved to inactive.

[Apillis]

Don't lie. She's not inactive, just reclusive and sleepy, she took a nap. She's awake nows!

[Rugs]

Reactivated n stuff

[Marcie's ℳℰℳℰS]

This bio is really nice! Enjoyed every moment of it.

I might think about asking this character to train if it isn't inactive.


~Cooljob

[Apillis]

Hervor is never inactive.

[Marcie's ℳℰℳℰS]

Well if you ever feel like teaching, my character is an apprentice always looking for teachings!


Apillis