The planet had no name, at least not one recorded on any galactic star map. To Kael, that was perfect.
The more obscure, the better.
Here, in the barren dunes of a forgotten world, he was free. Free from Jedi meddling. Free from Sith manipulation. Free from the tangled web of prophecy, clones, and galactic politics.
No eyes watched him. Not yet.
By the time he was five, Kael could hunt better than any man in his village. He had discovered that boosting Agility not only improved his physical prowess—it sharpened his reaction time, his balance, his ability to dodge, strike, and move in utter silence.
His father began to whisper of him with awe. The villagers spoke of him as a blessing—"the desert-born child touched by spirits."
He let them believe it.
The system continued to grow with him, unobtrusive but omnipresent.
He had learned to check it with a simple thought.
STATUS MENU
Name: Kael
Race: Human
Level: 7
Experience: 32/160
Stat Points Available: 0
Skill Points Available: 1
Attributes:
Strength: 11
Agility: 15
Midichlorian: 8,020 (+2 from 1 stat allocation)
Passive Skill:Veil of the Void (MAX)
Skills:
Force Manipulation Lv.3
Force Sense Lv.2
Combat Instinct Lv.2
Bone Craft Lv.1 (New – gained from crafting tools and weapons from animal remains)
He considered using his newest skill point. His Force Manipulation was his primary tool, and leveling it to 4 would enhance his ability to manipulate objects, increase the weight limit, and shorten focus time. But another skill had quietly grown in importance: Combat Instinct.
It wasn't flashy. It didn't lift rocks or push enemies. But it let him kill.
More efficiently. More precisely.
He set the skill point into it without hesitation.
[Combat Instinct Lv.3 → Lv.4]
+40% Effectiveness: Improved perception of enemy vulnerabilities, faster reaction to threats, and greater intuition in battle.
Kael had also begun crafting.
At first, it was to mask his growing abilities. A slingshot here, a bone knife there. But he realized quickly that tools—primitive though they were—could amplify his deadliness. Bone Craft had appeared when he successfully carved a multi-pronged spearhead from the spine of a sand lizard. Crude, but deadly.
He kept the weapon buried under the floor of his home. His mother called it a child's obsession.
She didn't understand.
The turning point came when a slaver ship crashed several kilometers north of the village.
The explosion shook the ground, a plume of fire licking the sky. Kael went alone, lying to his parents that he was tracking a night-runner beast. They believed him—they always did. By now, even they were beginning to fear him.
The wreckage was beautiful.
The ship had been pierced mid-flight, likely by pirates, and the slavers aboard were mostly dead. But three had survived—wounded, coughing blood, clutching blasters. They didn't see the boy approach until it was too late.
Kael used the Force.
One blaster flew from a dying man's grip. Another found itself crushed under a psychic grip. The third man—a Twi'lek—raised his pistol, but Kael's bone dagger slid cleanly under his jaw before he could pull the trigger.
[You have slain Slaver x3]
+90 XP
Level 8 Reached
+5 Stat Points, +1 Skill Point Earned
[Skill Acquired: Weapon Proficiency – Blaster Lv.1]
He didn't just loot them. He studied them.
The ship's comms were damaged but intact. He spent days sneaking back and forth, salvaging scraps, hiding pieces in a buried cache outside the village perimeter.
A comm device. A solar generator. Part of a targeting module. Maps.
Knowledge.
The system didn't level from learning technology, but Kael didn't care. This was his second weapon: understanding.
He activated the ship's remaining systems and downloaded every scrap of galactic data it could still access. Navigation logs, trade routes, even rumors from bounty hunter channels.
That night, under the desert moon, Kael sat cross-legged beside the humming generator, reading line after line of decrypted data projected onto the sand.
"Outer Rim trade destabilizing near Naboo… Jedi deploying new peacekeeping battalions… Hutt activity rising in sector 6A…"
He devoured it all.
This galaxy didn't just need a king. It needed a knife in the dark. A ruler forged in blood and fire. Not a chosen one. A self-made one.
He would not wait for destiny. He would build his own.
In the following weeks, he began shaping the first bricks of his future kingdom—not in stone, but in influence.
He healed a local child with subtle Force manipulation. He began offering tools to adults, sharpened blades and reinforced armor, all crafted by "the strange boy with death in his eyes."
He offered protection, guidance, predictions of danger. Carefully staged, of course—he caused many of the dangers himself.
Bandits? Kael led them to the outskirts and dispatched them at night.
Food shortages? He "miraculously" located new nests of desert-fish and scavenge-worthy ruins.
By the time he was six, the elders treated him like a prophet. He was no longer just Kael, son of Ralo.
He was becoming something else.
But power demanded sacrifice.
One night, as the village feasted after a rare rainstorm, Kael's mother pulled him aside. Her hands trembled.
"Kael... the things you do, the way you look at people. It's not natural. You speak like an old man trapped in a child's body."
He said nothing.
Her voice dropped to a whisper. "You frighten them. You frighten me."
His golden eyes met hers. Cold. Detached.
"I know."
She flinched, stepping back as if slapped.
"I won't stop you," she said after a long silence, "but you'll stand alone someday. Even we—your blood—may not follow."
Kael nodded once. Not in apology. In acknowledgment.
He had known this day would come.
Love was a weight. A shackle. His parents were kind. Good. Honest.
They could not walk where he was going.