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PROLOGUE Pre-25,000 B.B.Y. “The void darkness rules the vastness of space, but light always leads a pathway to destiny." - the first passage from the Whills Holy Book, the Journal of Hope The known galaxy, now in its infancy, was filled with darkness and yet something was shining - but it was not the stars. Powerful photon generators called Kragons, roughly the size of large asteroids, were arrayed along selected space routes to guide the fragile lightships of the Inner Rim to their nearest neighbors of the Outer Rim. The Kragons served as photon guideways for the Inner Rim Whill light ships. These were the earliest trade routes, established before time was recorded and only two races frequented them; the Whills, who dwelt upon the gold, crystal paradise world of Elysia and the mysterious dark Sith that dwelt upon a sweltering, bleak black water world known as Tirahnna. The Whills were the Founders of Light, eternal chronologists forever adding to their Sacred Journal of Hope which contained every battle between light and darkness; good and evil; justice and injustice in the known galaxy. Their Seers were the finest and most reputable prophets ever. It was the Whill Seers that had first sensed the unseen power of the hidden life force permeating and penetrating everything in existence and their discovery was coveted by the warrior Sith ever since the Whill Queen Serapha forbid the sharing of this knowledge based upon a secret vision of Lady Kaliah Askana, the Queen‘s daughter. Although a princess by birthright, as the greatest of Whill Seers alive she was known to every Whill as “Our Lady”. The Queen did not protest. The Sith had their own Seers, but their visions were often clouded by personal greed, lust, and ambition. Consequently, the Sith only used their visions for war- a constant state of war with every planet and species they came in contact with, except for the Whills, whose Seer knowledge they coveted for themselves. The Sith would wait, time was on their side. Since the Whills kept an open Journal of their Halo-chron visions and possessed the purest Seers in the galaxy, the Sith relied on them to some extent to foretell the outcome of their endless battles since Sith Seers often misguided their Masters for power, profit, or revenge. Hence, the Sith and Whills had lived in a tolerable co-existence since the beginning of their first contact. Trade was also good with the Whills, who possessed a range of technologies the Sith did not. But where the Whills excelled in one area of technology, the Sith excelled in another. The Whills relied on light conversion starships while the Sith had reactor ships not dependent on light. Traveling from the Inner to Outer Rim took time but the Sith could travel from the Outer to the Inner Rim very quickly. Trading usually took place somewhere halfway between the Rims with ship-to ship transfers. But ever since the Whills had kept the secret vision of Lady Kaliah unrecorded, an undeclared sporadic war had raged among the two races for two years along the photon guideways. Lord Rexor, Dark Master of Tirahnna had given the order, “capture the Whill Seer Lady Kaliah alive and bring her back to me”. His ominous appearance was projected by every holomorphic projector on the planet while loud audio-invasors blared his terrifying voice from global com carriers. Whenever Lord Rexor gave an order it was as if the voice of God had spoken. On Tirahnna, millions gave out a war-like cry and in unison the voice of a world was heard, “All hail, Dark Master!” While the Sith did not yet have the forces necessary to attack such a large planet as Elysia and since the Inner Rim worlds were more defiant to the Sith than the Outer Rim worlds… the Sith patiently waited and struck whenever an opportunity presented itself. Sith hunters had been sent to Elysia to capture Lady Kaliah but the brief battles proved pointless. The Seer was heavily guarded. Nevertheless, the attempts made by the Sith were ever-increasing and Queen Serapha felt it wise to move her daughter to a more secure area, a planet the Sith knew little of. This forced the Sith to turn to Varmin spies after their great Dark Seer Syrenia foresaw the Lady’s secret departure from the Elysian capital of Jeranu. Lady Kaliah, protected by an armed detachment of Amber Commandos, was placed in temporary seclusion on a planet thought to be outside the Sith reach until the Varmins located her hiding place. The Varmins are greedy, vile creatures and sworn adversaries of the Bothans. Fortunately, the Bothans had discovered the danger to Lady Kaliah through their own network of spies and had immediately warned her before the Sith could reach the remote planet Kaladar located along an old abandoned trade route the Sith rarely used. Now, she races home at great speed aboard her Rainbow-Class cruiser with the Sith on the hunt. …by way of the Kragons, the photon guideway a pathway of light in itself.
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