“So, you’re the one my father went out of his way to have brought to the academy?” A woman questioned Erin the moment he entered the well-lit chamber that had been at the end of the hall.
Garbed in a lightly armored version of the basic clothing he and the others wore, the dark-haired woman propped against the chamber's walls was an acolyte of respectable status. The sith warblade on her back said as much. The three scars that marred the dark brown skin around her left eye far more interesting than that fact. The product of a battle with a beast on this planet?
“I take it overseer Tremel sent you in his place.” Erin stated more than asked as he stepped over the burned and gouged K’lor’slug corpses that littered the chamber. She hadn’t been bored waiting on him.
“Clearly.” She said, tone as dry as the air around them. Her eyes ran along his figure, judging, analyzing. In the end a frown prevailed and her eyes narrowed, his failure to meet her expectations no secret. “He made a mistake sticking his neck out for you. What kind of sith resorts to carrying around a blaster?”
“No one I’ve killed has ever complained about the weapon I used.” He said with a smile. Lightsabers, vibroblades, blasters, it was all the same to him. He preferred lightsabers of course -few things in the known universe could hope to combat one for more than a few exchanges- but he wasn’t going to be a fool and pretend there weren’t situations were the others were more suitable.
The woman’s nose flared slightly as air left it, the very notion absurd to her. “If you possess any of the skill my father seems to think you do, your trial should be easy.” She said. “There is an ancient armory deep within this tomb. You are to retrieve a sith warblade from it and make your way to the academy.”
“A warblade? This soon? I was under the impression that acolytes had to prove themselves before earning one.”
“My thoughts exactly; I don’t know what my father is thinking. You’re an untrained weakling, I doubt you’ll make it halfway through the tomb before you die.” She spat with a glare. Her lips parted but closed and she pushed herself off the wall, moving to leave.
“Anything aside from these slugs that I should be worried about?” He asked.
“There’s nothing a real Sith couldn’t handle.” She disappeared down the hallway, her presence growing further and further away.
That was about as useful as the blaster strapped across his chest. What was so hard about telling him what to expect?
At least he had a proper goal now.
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K’lor’slugs, K’lor’slugs, and, how could he forget, more K’lor’slugs.
The woman, overseer Tremel, had sent to debrief him was right; no Sith worthy of the title would struggle to make headway in this dull tomb.
Erin pulled his vibroblades out of the neck of a sizable slug and it hit the ground with a thud, kicking up dust. He leaped off it and put away the deactivated blades.
Walking the tomb’s halls was as boring as fighting these creatures. His stroll past old statues and slugs was occasionally broken up by the dead bodies of initiates and troopers. Many were torn apart but some were marked by the burns of blaster fire. Each and everyone of them had been looted of their weapons.
Initiates killing one another or something else?
He attributed the desperation pervading the tomb's depths to others struggling to overcome their trial. That assumption might’ve been wrong. Could there be another group of people inside this tomb?
He'd find out soon enough.
A flight of stone stairs awaited him at the end of the hall. Fear held strong throughout it. Three maybe? He couldn’t be sure of the exact number, but people awaited him, an ambush prepped.
Erin wrapped the force around the corpse of a nearby initiate and sent it tumbling down the steps with a casual flick of his hand. Bright red blaster fire came from behind one of the pillars it passed, all missing the body. Several people peaked out from their hiding places then quickly shuffled out, rifles and pistols aimed up at him.
“Weapons and food. Drop any you have and we’ll let you go.” One of them ordered. “You’re just an initiate. That fancy space magic won’t be enough to save you from blaster fire.”
Five people, all of varying races, genders, and ages. Their clothing was rugged, covered in tears and burns. Those among them capable of growing hair, left it unkempt and overgrown.
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They’d been in this tomb for quite sometime.
He could entertain them. Play the subterfuge angle to get information, but why bother? Most initiates were already dead and the few survivors well on their way out of the tomb. There was little need to play the part of a former slave.
With a gesture from his fingers, he ripped the blasters from the rugged group’s hands, the weapons clattering on the steps around him. One of the pistols, pure black with a scratched up silver barrel, landed in his hand and he took aim at them.
Their shock morphed to fear. One moved to flee and a crimson shot to the back of the head left them tumbling down the stairs.
“W-Wait!” The raven haired woman that headed the group -the only human among them- spoke up. The others were shocked stiff by their ally’s sudden demise but she kept some semblance of composure, voice slightly cracking. “We thought you were just an initiate. We wouldn’t have dared to get in the way of a master sith.”
Right.
Erin fired another shot in the chest of one of the others. They fell back, hand falling away from the blaster holstered at their thigh.
“Try anything and you die.” Erin said. The warning cemented their burgeoning fear and the group slowly raised their hands, one or two shaking in place. He aimed the blaster at the dark haired woman. “Care to introduce your little group?”
“W-We’re not here by choice, okay? We’re just people who got a little unlucky.” Erin lightly pressed a finger to the blaster’s trigger. “Treasure! We came to this dustball because we heard about some old artifacts!”
“And did you find these artifacts?”
“M-Maybe, most of the stuff in these tombs are too old for any of us to recognize.”
“Any ancient weapons?” Erin asked, easing off the trigger.
“Not that I know of. Is a Sith weapon what you’re after?” The woman asked eagerly, clearly desperate to find any angle to ensure their survival. “We've seen rooms and vaults guarded by old droids. We-We can take you to them.”
Now that sounded promising. He was sure he’d be able to find it himself; only a handful of rooms in this place contained a darkness that spoke of intense bloodshed. If he didn’t find a warblade in one of them he’d be surprised. Making use of someone with intimate knowledge of the place would speed up the process.
“And you’re sure you know where these rooms are?” Erin asked.
The woman answered with rapid nods. “I've mapped out a good majority of-“
Erin fired two more shots, the remaining trio reduced to only the black haired woman, her short-lived relief twisted into a horror as her allies hit the ground.
He strolled over retrieving a black satchel from one of the corpses. A datapad, gas canisters, power packs, and some rations packaged in old brown wrapping. These people were prepared. After appropriating and attaching a leather holster to his thigh, Erin stood up and smiled at the frozen woman.
“Lead the way, friend.”
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The woman hadn’t been exaggerating her knowledge of the tomb. On every floor she led him down routes free of K’lor’slugs. The few times the nasty creatures gave chase, Erin cut them down before they could become a problem, not at all concerned by the woman attempting to make a break for it.
She was a lot smarter than her presence her suggested.
The so called unlucky group she belonged to was a fragmented coalition of treasure hunters. Whispers of the riches hidden on the planet led to various individual teams coming together and plotting out a way to pillage what they could from ruins on the planet before gaining any attention from The Empire.
They thought they could come to the homeworld of the Sith, plunder tombs of Sith Lords of the past, and leave unscathed? The very height of stupidity.
The plan inevitably backfired and now groups of treasure hunters were holed up all across Korriban, unable to leave the atmosphere without being shot out of the sky. That was assuming they even had working ships to make the attempt.
He had a feeling the academy kept them around for training purposes. They had fools that could thin out hopeless initiates while acolytes had plenty of chances to bloody new weapons and hone their abilities without resorting to infighting. A convenience like that rarely came about.
“You’re…You’re going to kill me aren’t you?” The woman stated more than asked as they stopped in the entranceway to a wide chamber. Part of the reason he’d kept her around was to interrogate her about her group. With those answers in hand and the map data stored on the datapad he took, the armory marked the end of the line for her.
“That is the plan.” Erin admitted.
The chamber looked near identical to any other in this place. A statue depicting Ajunta Pall at the back center with several smaller statues forming a sort of pathway to it. Below the main statue there was a metal weapon rack, a slot still filled. The wall were lined with coffin shaped containers, inactive gray droids stored within.
It wasn’t as grand or filled as expected but this was the armory he was in search of.
Without any fanfare, he freed his blaster pistol and fired a shot, the weapon returned to its holster by the time she collapsed. He could’ve used her to trigger any possible traps but her subdued cooperation earned her a painless death. Besides, he didn’t sense anything out of the ordinary and a few old droids weren’t going to be a problem.
Erin headed down to the weapon rack and pulled the warblade out of its slot. There was a significant difference in weight between it and vibroblades due to the thickness of the blade. Activating it wrapped the old silver blade in a sheen of crimson energy that hummed loud enough to fill the large chamber.
Whirls and beeps overpowered the hum.
The old droids stepped out of their coffins and leveled blasters at Erin as they moved to surround him. Red blaster fire came from all around.
Erin back flipped high into the air, landing behind one of the droids and slicing it in half. There was some resistance but the warblade’s power proved an effective tool against the armored chasis, the thing burnt through when he applied enough force. He took off, the force made to fuel his movements. Blaster fired trailed behind, targeting systems unable to keep up with his unnatural speed.
He raced and flipped around the droids until nothing more than scrap surrounded him.
Just as easy as he expected.
Erin left the chamber behind, filled with anticipation. Armed with this warblade, the academy awaited him.