"The Force does not echo the same in every chamber.Sometimes, it waits.Other times… it listens back."
The chamber was simple.
No datapads. No holos. No screens humming with information.
Only stone—cool, unpolished, and waiting.
Elai sat cross-legged in the center. The soft texture of the meditation mat barely registered beneath him. His eyes remained open, but unfocused—not searching, just present.
Coleman Kcaj stood at a respectful distance, arms folded behind his back. Silent. Still. But not passive. Watching, like a windless tree feels the air anyway.
Between them, a low table.
Upon it: seven objects, each mundane at first glance.
No instructions. No announcement of purpose.
Just presence.
A fragment of exposed circuitry.
A smooth shard of obsidian.
A wooden stylus, darkened with use.
A plant stem, cut at an angle, still green.
A dull, corroded tool.
A broken crystal, cracked at its heart.
And a small, empty clay bowl.
Elai didn't touch them.
Not at first.
He looked to Kcaj, not for permission—just clarity.
"These are memories," he said softly.
Kcaj's brow twitched, faintly.
"Explain."
"They've been carried. Broken. Used. Discarded. They're not just shapes. They hold... resonance."
He picked up the broken crystal.
For a long moment, he simply held it.
Then:
"Someone tried to create something from this. But it didn't shape the way they wanted. They thought it failed. But it wasn't a failure—it was the first step."
He placed it back, gently.
Kcaj took a step closer.
"Do you hear them?"
"No," Elai said. "Not like that."
His fingers moved toward the bowl.
"This one's for me."
Kcaj watched, but didn't interrupt.
Elai picked up the empty vessel.
He turned it in his hands, slowly, then set it on the floor before him.
"Everything else was made by someone else," Elai said. "This one is mine now. Because it's still listening."
Kcaj finally sat.
Cross-legged across from the child, he spoke with quiet intensity.
"Some Jedi test the Force. Some wait for it to answer. You... let it show you."
Elai looked at the bowl.
Then reached into the satchel on his side—withdrawn from his tunic, now gently hanging.
He took out a smooth stone, unremarkable, and placed it in the bowl.
"What's that?" Kcaj asked.
Elai didn't look up.
"Something I kept. Because it stayed."
Kcaj nodded, slowly.
Then reached over and touched the side of the bowl. Just for a second.
And in that second, he understood something that couldn't be taught.
Not in words.
Not in scripts.
Just in presence.
[System Notice: New Training Protocols Recognized]
You have demonstrated instinctual Force attunement.
You responded not with command, but with awareness.
Lessons awakened through observation, not directive.
[Stat Gain:]
Perception +1
Intuition +1
The Master nodded slowly.
He walked across the stone chamber and opened a recessed panel in the wall. From within, he retrieved a training drone—worn, dented, but still functional.
It hovered upward and blinked.
Twice.
Then activated with a sharp hum.
"This will sting," Kcaj said simply.
The sphere whirred, scanning.
Then it fired.
Elai didn't move at first.
Then—
A breath. A shift.
Not a dodge. A lean.
The bolt grazed his shoulder's shadow and struck the wall with a sharp hiss.
Another shot.
Faster.
Elai pivoted this time—his hands still resting near his lap, his eyes half-lidded. The bolt missed by a hand's width. The next one came with no rhythm.
Three.
Four.
Five shots.
Each one is faster than the last.
Elai didn't flinch. He moved when the Force whispered—not before.
Kcaj circled behind the remote. Increased the difficulty.
Switched to multi-directional fire.
Now two drones rose from hidden alcoves. Their lights blinked red.
Elai rose to his feet, barefoot and balanced.
The room hissed with bolts.
Seryth growled once, but did not move.
She watched—ears turned, body coiled, but patient.
She knew her part.
Elai spun once.
Bent low.
Moved sideways through a volley of fire as if following a ripple in water.
The remotes paused—confused, even in their programmed logic.
Kcaj adjusted again. This time, he enabled seeker fire—bolts that tracked movement and velocity.
"You can strike them," Kcaj said gently. "Push them back. Deflect. You're allowed."
Elai didn't answer.
The bolts came.
Faster.
Then one—direct to the chest.
It struck.
Not his body.
Master Kcaj intervenes using the force to shield Elai deflected it.
The bolt hit the floor and fizzled out.
He hadn't dodged it.
He'd been absent from where it landed.
Kcaj deactivated the sequence. The remotes hissed and dropped to idle.
He crossed the room in silence, until they stood almost level.
"Why don't you strike back?" the Master asked.
Elai turned, voice quiet, but unwavering.
"I don't know how to"
Kcaj stared at him for a long time.
"And if it was?"
Elai looked down. Didn't know how to answer that.
[System Update: Combat Trial — Observation Over Reaction Completed]
You chose restraint over violence.
You listened to the Force instead of following instinct.
The remote learned pattern. You did not offer one.
[Stat Gain:]
Reaction +1
Focus +1
Agility+1
Later, in the same room, Kcaj returned with a long, rolled parchment wrapped in deep violet cloth.
He placed it on the table between them and slowly unwrapped it.
It wasn't a Jedi scroll.
Not from any archive Elai had seen.
If it belonged anywhere, it was somewhere older than memory.
The parchment was aged—not brittle, but worn smooth by time and touch.
The script upon it spiraled instead of flowing.
Lines curved like songs turned to ink.
Some parts shimmered faintly when the light moved.
"Can you read this?" Kcaj asked.
Elai leaned closer.
The markings made no sense.
No characters.
No phonetics.
No grammar.
But something moved beneath them.
His voice, when it came, was slow.
"It's not language," he said.
"It's rhythm."
Kcaj tilted his head.
"You see the rhythm?"
Elai's eyes stayed on the page.
"I hear it," he said, "when I look long enough."
He reached out—only briefly—and touched the edge of the scroll.
His fingertips brushed the parchment, and for a moment, the Force within the room tightened.
Not loud.
Not bright.
But present.
Then he withdrew his hand.
"No meaning?" Kcaj asked.
Elai shook his head.
"I don't know what it says.
But I know it was said."
Kcaj studie him.
Then, for the first time since their arrival, he sat—not looming, not testing.
Just across from the child. Equal in presence, if not in role.
"You're not here to impress me, Elai," he said softly.
"You're here so I can see what you protect without knowing."
Elai nodded once. No smile. No reaction.
But something in his posture eased.
He looked again at the table.
The objects were still there.
Then his gaze fell to the empty bowl.
Quietly, he reached for it.
Lifted it into his lap.
Hold it with both hands like something sacred—not fragile, but purposeful.
And then—he simply waited.
As if he knew
the next lesson
would arrive on its own.
A quiet chime echoed from the hallway beyond.
Training time had ended.
But Kcaj didn't rise.
He remained seated across from Elai, the old scroll still rolled out between them like a question not yet asked aloud. The bowl rested quietly in the boy's lap. His eyes weren't closed—but they weren't looking, either. Only sensing.
Far above the stone chamber, a viewport shimmered open in the curved observatory alcove.
The room held no council seating. No heraldry. Just wide glass, soft light, and the kind of hush that only followed when Jedi chose to say nothing.
Several Masters stood in thoughtful posture, not all physically present. Some shimmered in holographic form—projected across systems, their figures rimmed with faint distortion from distance. Others were there in body, cloaked and observant. Not part of the Council, not summoned. But present.
They had come because word had spread.
A child.
A wolf.
A method that was not a method.
Not all watched with approval.
But all watched.
Below, the chamber looked small. Sparse. But the boy within it held it like a field—his stillness drawing in the light without needing to command it.
"No forms. No saber practice. No katas," Mace Windu said at last. His voice was quiet, but edged. "Kcaj teaches by waiting."
"He teaches by listening," Shaak Ti replied, softer. "The difference matters."
Ki-Adi-Mundi's arms folded, his brow marked with doubt. "But for what? We cannot expect a child to instruct himself in the Force."
"He already has," came a voice behind them.
Plo Koon.
He stood near the back of the alcove, hands clasped loosely, his breath masked by the soft hum of his rebreather. His presence did not demand space—but it filled it nonetheless.
"You believe he's trained?" Adi Gallia asked, turning.
"No," Plo answered. "I believe the Force has shaped him longer than we realize. Kcaj isn't filling a vessel. He's finding where the vessel ends."
That answer was not comforting.
But it was hard to refute.
Yoda stood apart from them, near the highest arc of the viewport. His hands were folded into his sleeves. His ears are unmoving. But his gaze did not shift from the boy.
He watched the way Elai touched each object.
How his hands never rushed.
How his awareness unfolded before action.
"Force, the child does," Yoda murmured. "Deeper than most."
Windu's voice was cooler.
"That may be true. But Force alone does not make a Jedi."
A flicker passed through the feed.
Kcaj moved again—unrolling the scroll once more, placing it silently between them. There were no words. No commands. Just the test of presence.
The child reached forward.
Not to answer, but to listen.
"He challenges the Council," Windu muttered. "Even in silence."
Yoda's ears shifted slightly at that.
"Perhaps," he said slowly, "challenged… it is the Council, that must be."
That silence deepened.
And beyond the Council, behind the arch of the observatory alcove, others still stood. Jedi Masters and Knights who had come by word, not summons. Their robes were plain. Their expressions varied. Some leaned forward. Others remained still. No one spoke.
The child had not made a choice.
But the Force had.
And the Temple was listening—though not all agreed on what it heard.
When the feed dimmed and the observers dispersed, the light in the room remained faint. No vote had been cast. No doctrine pronounced.
But something had shifted.
Not in favor.
Not against.
Just motion—like wind against a mountain that had been still for too long.
The halls of the Jedi Temple were not cold—but they were quiet with purpose. Every stone tile bore the weight of generations. The light that spilled from the high windows was gentle but unwavering, designed to foster reflection rather than comfort.
This was a place for shaping.
Elai moved through it barefoot, the silence folding around his steps. His robes were simpler than the younglings', not uniform. His presence didn't announce itself—it disturbed nothing—but still, eyes followed.
Not because he demanded it.
But because something in him refused to be ignored.
Seryth walked behind him, not closely, but with the unmistakable calm of something wild that had chosen to be here—and nowhere else. The Loth-wolf's pale fur caught and scattered the Temple's light like wind through frost.
Jedi Knights passed in conversation.
Some fell silent as he passed.
One leaned in to another and whispered, "That's the one from the Council chamber."
The other simply nodded.
They reached the Temple cafeteria—a grand, tiered dome with high arches and long tables arranged in quiet symmetry. Hundreds of younglings were scattered across it, eating in murmured clusters of brown-robed familiarity.
This was a room of learning too.
How to belong.
Where to sit.
Elai paused at the entrance.
Seryth stopped just behind him, then padded over to a smooth column near the threshold and lay down with deliberate care. Her head rested across her paws, but her ears stayed upright.
Elai crossed to the serving table, took a small bowl of nut broth, two slices of pressed grain loaf, and a carved spoon. The droid behind the counter blinked once, recognizing no designation code—but said nothing.
He walked to the farthest arc of the room.
No one sat at the table there.
He didn't hesitate.
As he ate, the sounds of conversation shifted faintly around him.
A few children peeked.
One Jedi Knight, leaning against the archway, watched for a moment longer than casual, then returned to quiet observation.
Near the middle of the room, a group of younglings—eight or nine in total, the Bear Clan—clustered together over trays and whispered.
One of them—a Nautolan girl with green skin and curious eyes—stood first.
She approached Elai carefully, glancing once at the wolf by the door, then back at him.
Her voice wasn't mocking. Just full of the kind of boldness that came from honest curiosity.
"Is that your wolf?"
Elai looked up from his broth.
"She's herself," he said simply.
The girl tilted her head. "That's a strange answer."
Elai blinked once. "She said it to me once."
There was a pause.
Then the Nautolan laughed—a light sound that carried toward the others. They whispered again, then another child, a human boy this time, stepped forward.
"You can sit with us if you want," he said, shifting from foot to foot like he wasn't sure if he should've said it.
Elai didn't answer right away.
He glanced toward the column where Seryth lay.
The Loth-wolf blinked slowly. Not a command. Just… a presence.
Elai picked up his tray and walked with them.
They made space in their circle.
Not ceremonially—awkwardly, like kids do.
And Elai sat.
Seryth did not follow.
She remained curled by the door, watching without judgment.
Her silence filled the space she didn't enter.
But at that table—where robes rustled and questions began to form—Elai spoke when spoken to.
He asked one child their name.
Listened when another explained the game they played in the sparring hall.
Did not try to belong.
But the others began to feel like he already did.
Later that evening, after the hum of the Temple had dulled and most younglings had retired to their quarters, Elai walked the halls with no escort.
He didn't need one.
He moved as if he'd always been here—though no one quite believed that.
Seryth padded silently at his side, her white fur faintly luminous in the low evening light. Not one Temple guard stopped them.
Eventually, they came to a modest chamber tucked deep within the old stone wing—where the walls no longer whispered instruction, but memory.
Inside, Master Coleman Kcaj was already seated.
He hadn't lit the room, but the stars beyond the high arched window cast soft bands of silver across the floor.
"There's a mat for you, near the wall," Kcaj said, without looking up.
Elai moved to it without hesitation.
He curled down, Seryth resting at his side.
Not a word more was exchanged.
But the stillness was warm, not cold.
And Elai slept—not quickly, but completely.
When Elai woke, the chamber's quiet held a different kind of hush.
Not resting.
Not waiting.
Something leaning forward.
Kcaj stood by the open threshold, robes still, hands folded within sleeves.
He held nothing.
No datapad.
No scroll.
Only intent.
"Today," the Master said, "we walk deeper."
Elai rose.
Seryth stirred beside him—then stretched, white fur rippling with silent wakefulness, and followed at his side.
They did not go to the usual chamber.
They walked through two curved hallways, down a stair passage lined with ancient carvings—older than the Temple above. No guides. No markers.
They arrived in a round room, quieter than the rest. The walls were matte black stone, veined with mineral light. In its center: a low platform holding only a few arranged components. Metal, focus lenses, a kyber socket. All clean. All unfinished.
Kcaj motioned to the center.
"This," he said, "is where we begin the shape of the saber."
Elai studied the pieces. He didn't move toward them yet.
Kcaj continued.
"To the Temple, a saber is a symbol. A tool. A burden.
But to the Force, it's none of those.
It's a mirror.
One you build with your hands… but also with your presence."
The Master knelt across from him—not lowering his voice for reverence, but for precision.
"Each part matters. But not for what it does.
For how it listens.
Some metals refuse each other. Some crystals reject casings. Some emitters sing only under specific balances.
This isn't construction.
It's a conversation."
Elai's gaze drifted across the emitter matrix, the magnetic coil, the focusing lens array.
"I'm not supposed to use my crystal," he said.
Kcaj nodded. "Correct. Not yet.
First we learn if your shape can hold any light at all."
He reached into his robe and retrieved a crystal—not Elai's.
It was small, dull—unbonded.
"Just a spark-stone," he said. "For test-fitting. The Temple uses it to confirm alignment and power flow."
Elai nodded once.
Kcaj gestured. "Begin. As you feel it."
The boy moved forward, silent.
Hands steady.
One piece at a time, he arranged them.
No hesitation.
But no rush.
Each part was studied. Not like a student, but like a presence being introduced.
The casing accepted the emitter. The coil nested without resistance.
No guides.
No manuals.
Only attention.
It took time.
And when the last piece was fitted, Kcaj offered the test crystal.
Elai took it—felt nothing.
Not rejection. Not resonance.
Just… neutrality.
He slid it into place.
The hilt clicked softly.
Elai looked at Kcaj.
The Master didn't speak.
Elai closed his hand around it.
A hum sparked from the casing—light burst forward, flickering blue and soft. The saber hissed to life for only a moment—then Kcaj deactivated it with a touch on the override panel.
He removed the crystal.
The saber, now complete, sat silent again.
"Well done," Kcaj said quietly.
"I didn't feel anything," Elai said.
"That's not the point," Kcaj replied.
"This wasn't to feel the Force.
It was to prove you can hold its shape."
Elai looked down at the empty hilt.
"It's not mine yet," he said.
Kcaj gave a small nod.
"No.
But it's listening."
"You can try to use your Kyber crystal this time"
It pulsed faintly, twin hearts still undivided: one white as frozen light, the other dark as starless sky.
Elai stepped forward.
But instead of reaching for the test saber, he began gathering pieces again.
Not for one hilt.
For two.
Kcaj didn't interrupt.
The boy worked slowly.
Not repeating the previous build—redesigning.
Each hilt was different.
Not symmetrical.
Not mirrored.
But they spoke to each other.
He shaped one with curved grip and hollowed channeling fins—meant to hold the white half.
The other was heavier, more grounded. Weighted. With baffles meant for cooling, not speed.
Made for the black star-light core.
When the frames were done, Elai picked up the crystal.
And it did not split.
Instead, it settled—balanced perfectly within the first hilt.
Then the second.
He did not ignite them.
He closed the hilts gently and set them down beside one another.
Kcaj, for the first time, looked surprised.
"You separated them in design… but not in truth."
Elai nodded.
"They're still one.
But now… they have voices."
Kcaj stepped forward.
"Remove them," he said softly. "Until the time is right."
Elai did.
He placed the crystal back into its cloth wrap, folded it, and stored it beneath his robe.
Then he sat. Still.
And the system stirred.
[System Update: Twin Hilts Constructed — Sabers of Balanced Voice]
The Force does not reward power. It rewards harmony.
[Stat Gain:]
Focus +1
Intuition +1
New Tag Unlocked: Saber Resonance (Dormant)
Two forms. One bond. The crystal remembers which shape listens best.
They did not take the main path to the training grounds.
Instead, Kcaj led Elai through a narrow corridor lined with forgotten murals, into a passage that twisted behind the archival wings. At its end stood an ancient arch—its carvings dulled by time, half-swallowed by vines. They stepped through.
Beyond it lay a quiet garden, hidden beneath the weight of the Temple.
Sunlight filtered down through cracked skylights thick with ivy, casting fractured beams across stone paths and moss-covered roots. The walls were overgrown. The air hummed—not with machinery, but memory.
Here, nothing was sterile.
The moss beneath Elai's feet felt soft, almost warm, as if the garden had been waiting. Songbirds flitted between silver-leaved trees, their calls layered in natural rhythm—no emitter, no programming. Just life.
Kcaj sat upon a low, time-worn slab at the garden's heart.
Elai approached, settled across from him. Seryth circled once, then lay beneath the shade of an old flowering branch, head resting on her paws, eyes half-closed but watchful.
Kcaj spoke quietly.
"Today, we begin with your name."
Elai frowned slightly.
"I already have one."
"You do," Kcaj agreed. "One given. One received. But not all names are spoken aloud. Some are remembered in silence. Others—still waiting to be heard."
He reached into his robe and withdrew a flat disc—pale, polished, nearly translucent. Its surface didn't reflect the garden around them, nor their faces. But something within it shimmered, as though echoing deep beneath the surface—like the call of distant roots through waterlogged stone.
"This," Kcaj said, placing it between them, "will not tell you your name. It will show you how to listen to it."
He gestured gently.
"Touch it. But don't look with your eyes. Don't listen with your ears.Listen with the force"
[💠 System Update: Trial Initiated – True Name and the Force's Song]
Names are not given. They are found.
And some are sung only when the silence remembers you.
Listen. Witness. Become.
Elai reached forward.
His fingers touched the disc.
The garden did not vanish—not at once.
It faded slowly, like a dream willingly released at sunrise.
The sounds thinned. The moss beneath him cooled. And the light—
It shifted. Not brighter. Not darker.
Clearer.
He was no longer in the Temple garden.
He stood on a quiet rise, atop stone veined with living light. The hill breathed—not literally, but in the rhythm of energy flowing beneath it. Grass whispered beneath his bare feet, glowing faintly where he stepped.
Above him stretched a sky the color of deep jade, with drifting clouds that shimmered like memory.
And across the horizon, threads of golden light twisted and curled in the air—visible threads of the Force, flowing like slow wind, each one humming in a tone just barely audible to the soul.
He didn't speak. He didn't move yet.
Because something was waiting here.
Not a being.
Not a voice.
But something that remembered him.
And far off, across the rolling fields of starlit wind, the outline of a distant land took shape—sharp-edged cliffs, crystal rivers, and spires wrapped in vines that moved as if alive.
His home.
Or the idea of it.
He didn't know the name.
But he knew he had once sung its song.
Below the hill, the city stretched like crystal grown from the bones of trees.
Not built—breathed.
Towers spiraled in harmony with massive silver-barked trunks, their foundations laced through ancient roots instead of cutting them. Homes blossomed from the sides of living boughs like petals opening at dusk, shaped not by tool, but by intention.
The Vaelori did not command nature.
They walked with it.
Every step was permission.
Every stone remembered a song.
Children ran barefoot along bridges woven from flowering vine and sun-hardened resin, laughter trailing like falling leaves. Antlered beasts rested in shade, feathers ruffling as they stretched beside pools that glowed with inner light—blue, green, and gold.
No speeders hummed.
No droids clicked.
The city moved with rhythm, not noise.
With presence, not function.
Elai's breath caught.
It wasn't memory—not in the way holos remember.
It was a sensation. A chord struck within the Force, resonating like his own name whispered back to him.
And then—warmth.
Hands, slender and glowing faintly at the tips, cupped the sides of his head. Fingers so familiar they still had time.
His mother.
Her voice was low and certain, like roots speaking to stone.
"You'll grow into your name," she whispered.
"But first, you must carry it."
She placed a circlet of windroot vine across his brow—its stem pulsing with soft green light, tuned to him.
He turned to look at her.
But her features... drifted.
Like breath in cold air.
Like smoke pulled back into the sky.
The moment dissolved—
—and the sky above shifted.
A darkness spread across the high canopy, stretching like oil spilled across light. The trees leaned as if listening to a distant scream. But no sound came.
No ships.
No sirens.
Just silence.
Not the kind that precedes violence.
The kind that unthreads memory.
Elai felt it.
The Force in the air began to falter—threads fraying, song notes unraveling. The harmony of the world strained, then dulled.
Leaves curled.
Water ceased its flow.
The roots themselves began to forget their purpose.
He wasn't the only one to notice.
Cries rang out—not in rage, but disorientation.
The people were not dying.
They were vanishing.
Unmade.
A figure sprinted through the unraveling city—his father.
Broad-shouldered. Hair woven with starmetal beads.
A cloak drawn tight against the storm.
"Elai!" he called.
And the child ran.
They reached the central hall—a great spiraling sanctum deep within the city's lowest roots. It pulsed with the last concentration of memory, glowing with the city's stored breath.
Others were already there.
Not fighting.
Preparing.
Vaelori elders stood by pods shaped like seeds, grown from memory-rich rootstone—vessels meant not for travel, but for planting. For carrying life through time.
His mother was already inside.
His father knelt, pressing his forehead to Elai's. His hands trembled only once.
"Where you go, we follow," he whispered. "Even if only in song."
His mother wept.
But her voice did not waver:
"Not goodbye.
A breath carried far."
The seed-pod closed, light curling inward like a closing eye.
There was no roar of engines.
Only the flicker of stars.
The pulse of motion.
Then silence.
Then—
Darkness.
And when the darkness cleared…
He was alone.
Not lost.
Not erased.
But I remembered.
Elai blinked.
The garden around him remained still, though its light felt farther away—like a melody remembered just after waking. The stone beneath him was warm, but no longer singing.
The Force mirror sat motionless between his palms, its surface dulled to quiet glass.
Across from him, Kcaj had not moved.
He did not speak.
He did not probe.
He simply watched.
As if listening to a note Elai had not yet played aloud.
Elai lowered his gaze.
A faint shimmer danced across his right palm, curling in lines too fine to be etched by hand. They pulsed once, softly, before settling into the shape of a sigil—curved and ancient.
The Vaelori symbol for echo.
A quiet chime unfolded deep in his mind—not from the Temple, but from the system that had lived alongside him since the silence of his exile.
[System Notice: Memory Synchronization Complete]
Echo Archive — 1/??? Unlocked
[Race Ancestry Identified: Vaelori]
Memory Lineage Recovered
The mirror stopped glowing.
The moment closed.
And the garden slowly returned—filtered sunlight streaming once more through the vine-choked skylight, catching dust in golden ribbons.
Elai exhaled.
Not with sorrow.
With return.
His voice came softly.
"I remember… what I lost.
And who gave me my name."
Kcaj's brow remained still, but his voice lowered—almost inaudible.
"You saw it."
Elai didn't nod.
He simply raised his hand slightly. The sigil still shimmered, barely visible beneath the skin. Not burning. Not glowing.
Just there.
"My home.
My parents.
My name."
Kcaj leaned forward, hands resting on his knees.
"And the end of it?"
Elai looked down again—not in shame, not in fear.
Only because it was too much to carry all at once.
"They didn't run.
They put me in the pod not out of panic… but purpose."
His fingers traced the edge of the mirror once, then withdrew.
"They knew they would end.
But I will continue.
And I've carried that… like silence ever since."
Kcaj nodded slowly, like a tree bowing to a storm rather than resisting it.
"Not grief," he said, "but distance. The echo between now and what was."
Elai's eyes stayed on the stone floor.
But his words were clear.
"It felt like they were still watching me."
Kcaj glanced up toward the garden's arched canopy, where vines curled against fractured stone and the filtered sunlight of Coruscant spilled through.
"Maybe they are," he said. "The Force remembers more than most do. And forgets less."
They didn't speak after that.
They didn't need to.
The silence that followed was not the silence of emptiness.
It was heavy.
Acknowledgement.
And—for Elai—relief.
No ritual.
No rite.
Just the quiet shift of something long-buried finally being seen.
[Quest Complete: The Name and the Mirror]
You faced what you forgot. You remembered without retreat. You carry memory without letting it carry you.
[Stat Gain:]
Wisdom +1
Force Sensitivity +2
[New Trait Gained: Songbound I]
"The Force responds faster to you during moments of internal stillness. Echoes linger longer when you do not reach."
That evening, just before the highest towers swallowed the suns, Elai stood alone by the tall, narrow window of his quarters.
Seryth slept nearby, her ears occasionally twitching in dreams, her breathing a soft rhythm behind him.
The city of Coruscant glittered far below.
Not like stars.
More like memory—too many lights to name, but none that called him home.
And for the first time, he didn't look for the old constellations.
He didn't search the skyline for the outline of a ship, or a seedpod, or a world now lost.
He simply stood there.
Listening.
Not for answers.
Not even for the Song.
But for what came next.
And somewhere deep within, the Force answered.
Not with a voice.
But with waiting.
Elai lay curled on the sleep mat beneath the dim light of his quarters.
The room was quiet—cool stone walls, a single folded blanket, and the soft sound of Seryth's breath as she rested nearby.
He watched the ceiling for a while, eyes half-lidded.
The day pressed gently against him, not heavy—just full.
Seryth shifted once, then settled again, her head resting near his hand.
Elai reached out.
Felt her warmth.
And closed his eyes.
Sleep came like the tide.
Slow.
Unspoken.
But certain.