Many Sith suffer from tissue necrosis. I suspect that midichlorians can cause intoxication upon reckless use of the Force.
An acquaintance of mine had a rare form of cerebral necrosis...
"Your face is doubly irritating today."
Force lightning flew in my direction, so I raised my iron sword and grounded the electricity.
Looking around, I saw the arena I had been forcibly dragged into. The circular walled structure allowed the Sith to train without being distracted by outsiders.
The rental cost me a staggering 500 gold coins. Pure robbery. Why am I paying for a place where I get beaten up?
"Why don't you satisfy your animal instincts, and then I will ask a small favor of you. I can even say I lost, and that you are the greatest Sith'ari in the Empire."
A paving tile from the combat arena launched into the air and flew straight at my face.
Simultaneously, Erra activated her lightsaber and pushed herself back with telekinesis.
I pulled a crystal from my pouch and channeled a small amount of the Force into it. The artifact activated, forming a stable Force barrier around me.
Shielded from the stones, I drew my blaster and began firing at my opponent. She was forced to defend with her lightsaber, while I managed to push myself away with telekinesis, distancing myself once more.
"Again! Kreso, fight like a Sith!"
She aimed her free hand at me, and I only had time to throw up an additional Force barrier.
The Force blast crossed dozens of meters and slammed me into the wall. Erra intended to exploit the situation, but she failed to notice the dark Force, in the form of a whip, wrapping around her leg.
Jerking herself away with telekinesis, she cried out in pain and fell to the ground with a dislocated leg. I could have savored the moment, but her spell had shattered all my barriers and broken my ribs, my leg, and the fingers of my right hand.
"You rabid Tuk'ata female! We agreed not to use Force blasts!"
Erra examined her leg, considering the best way to pop it back into place.
"You spent ten minutes dodging a lightsaber duel!"
I rummaged in my pouch and drank a healing potion. The pain subsided immediately, but I had to slightly engage my telekinesis to stabilize the position of my own bones.
Erra looked no better than I did; her leg was severely swollen, preventing her from walking. She managed to reset the joint, but the damage was quite significant.
"Need some?"
I pulled out another potion from my pouch, one that had miraculously survived her magic.
"Give it."
Erra snatched the bottle and began liberally pouring it over her leg.
"We fought. Can we talk now?"
She sat on the arena floor and began filling her body with the Force.
"Knowing your rotten nature, you need something from me."
I finally relaxed and began fusing my bones. The dark side of the Force was irritating, but right now, this specific energy would help my body recover.
"I want to invite you on a shopping trip."
Erra narrowed her eyes, entirely disbelieving my words. We knew each other quite well.
"What's the catch?"
I shrugged. I had the most innocent face in the entire Sith race.
"Use your gift of foresight."
Erra muttered her magic for a few minutes, then stood up and unleashed lightning at me.
"Tuk'ata shit! A shopping trip is not a visit to the slave market!"
She shattered my Force barrier, and residual electricity burned my arm.
"I need to find a pilot. You're the one who can afford a safe staff position."
Erra extended her hand and displayed a perfectly clear gesture.
"Pay."
I shook her hand and tried to help her to her feet. Erra displayed her animal nature, attempting to yank me to the ground and trip me.
In response, I stepped on her toes with my heel. The Sith could barely restrain herself from using Force lightning again.
"Help me out, for old times' sake."
Tired of my persistence, she stood up and dusted off her clothes.
"Greedy Rakatan degenerate. Let's go look at the slaves, but you owe me."
Wasting no time, I dragged her out of the arena and into the city streets. After walking two hundred meters, we hailed a taxi and awaited its arrival.
"I'll repay the debt when we return from the war."
Erra took my datapad and rerouted the trip. Taking it back, I realized she had already used her divination magic: instead of the large slave market, we were heading to an area of the city unknown to me.
"I hope you don't plan on dying. It would be a shame if my services went unpaid."
A giant, bat-like monster landed on the landing pad. Its rider was an ordinary human, but the bright slave brand displayed his low status.
The fare immediately appeared on my datapad. I pulled out my purse and grabbed a few gold coins. The rider took the money and pressed a confirmation on his datapad.
The beast lowered itself onto its belly. Erra and I walked onto its back and sat on the couch. The monster sensed a stronger concentration of dark Force from us and was consequently experiencing extreme terror.
The taxi finally took off, the human carefully tugging at the tendrils on the monster's head. Tens of thousands of various flying creatures flew alongside us; experienced riders maintained their distance and prevented accidents.
"How is life on Ziost?"
Erra directed a little Force toward the scales. The ridges on the back twisted and rose like walls. Rid of the irritating wind, she nodded in satisfaction.
"Cold. The number of bastards per square meter is off the charts, but it's better than your Corriz. There isn't even an arena for slave gladiator fights here. The only entertainment is brothels, target shooting, and races."
"You exaggerate. There are other forms of entertainment here."
The monster swooped over the city market and decreased altitude. New metallic buildings were interspersed with old structures. Slaves performing domestic tasks walked the streets, and a bit further away, Sith training was underway.
As on any planet, there was a Sith Academy for Force adepts here.
"Alcohol or drugs?"
I realized she was mocking me, and we spent the rest of the flight enjoying the silence.
The monster landed, and the rider flew off to another call.
This part of the city was built up much more densely, the streets even narrower. This architecture was not designed for wheeled vehicles or speeders.
Erra led us, guided by the Force. Try as I might, the Force hates me too much; I cannot predict the future beyond a few seconds.
According to her, it requires trusting the Force and following the visions. This Force technique demands loosening one's control over the Force, which conflicts heavily with how I wield magic.
We reached our destination fairly quickly, and I saw a square where a debt-slave fair was being held. Erra smiled proudly, and I could only envy her.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
The Force told her to go there, we listened, and we got what we wanted. It's so convenient! So lazy!
Extremely dangerous!
I cannot understand how the Sith and the Jedi fail to see the problem!
The Force possesses no moral constraints. Unlike the Jedi, who suppressed their emotions, the Sith surrendered entirely to their desires, drawing energy from them to increase their power.
It is a vicious cycle — the more power you have, the greater the thirst. You will never achieve satisfaction. The Sith became prisoners of the Sith Code's philosophy. Power for the sake of power? Idiocy. The Force makes us slaves to our own lust for power. The Force should only be a dangerous tool used to achieve more significant goals.
The dark side of the Force was not merely an abstract concept — it was a living, sentient, and malicious entity. This energetic parasite flowed through all living things.
For many Sith, the ability to summon Force lightning was a mark of mastery and power, but it was merely Sorzus Syn's trap.
The Jedi always followed the Force and were foolish puppets of this entity. Their entire ideology is built upon the suicidal dissolution of the self and merging with the Force to disappear from this world forever.
The Sith believe the dark Force serves their goals, but Force techniques like divination are entirely too convenient. Emotions empower a Sith, but the dark Force can revoke that rapid empowerment at any moment.
The more talented Sith, like Erra, rely on conveniences like Force promptings, the less they think with their own heads. Sooner or later, the dark Force will deceive them, and the Sith, like a total imbecile, will believe it.
What, then, separates us from the senile imbeciles of the Jedi? The more I think about it, the more I understand why the Rule of Two was created.
The primary enemy of an immortal Sith is the will of the Force. If other Sith serve the enemy, then it is wiser to eliminate them.
Erra nudged me with her elbow and pointed to the merchandise inspection area.
Several types of slavery exist in the Empire.
House slaves were the most privileged group. These were slaves who had served in the noble houses of the Empire for thousands of years. Among them were many Sith and even more humans with traces of Sith blood.
The master provided work, money, food, and housing, and guaranteed security. In exchange, the nobles received incredibly fanatical loyalty from the slaves.
If a slave rebellion broke out, or if enemies attacked the master, the house slaves were the ones who would do everything to ensure their master's well-being.
In a sense, they live a more stable and comfortable life than the free citizens of Alsakan.
The next group were the labor slaves. They are the property of the Empire; they fueled the productivity of an emerging state capitalism.
The taxi we used, the factories, the food, the infrastructure maintenance — almost everything in this Empire was the product of labor slaves.
Slaves of this group were born into slave families loyal to the Empire, and the Empire does everything to maximize their productivity. Their life is not particularly pleasant, and work in the Empire is not easy, but they have complete protection from the actions of individual Sith.
Isolated incidents result in colossal fines or enslavement; repeated attempts to harm the Empire are punished even more severely.
Some Sith Lords might try to kill labor slaves, but even they would face the wrath of the Empire. Labor slaves are the foundation of the Sith's parasitic existence, and the most powerful Lords sit on the Dark Council.
The most miserable demographic is the private slaves. They are the personal property of a master. A Sith has the right to do whatever they wish with their property.
The final group is the temporary slaves. There are no prisons in the Sith Empire, so all criminals must work for the benefit of the Sith. Free citizens can fall into debt and be made debt-slaves until they repay the money.
Temporary slaves can be laborers or private property, but their rights and security are guaranteed by the Empire.
At the same time, any Force-sensitive slave could pass through the Sith Academy. Graduates received the status of Sith, which is why not all Sith in the Empire are Sith from the perspective of the original species.
The second method was the duel: in the presence of a state observer, a slave could kill their master and earn their freedom.
The third method is the military. Every master is obligated to submit their slaves to the military academy every five years. The slaves' abilities are tested; if the Empire needs a specific, highly specialized soldier, the slaves can be purchased by the Empire and must work off ten times the Empire's expenditure for their liberation.
The Sith Empire has existed for tens of thousands of years. We have survived thousands of slave rebellions, and consequently, we possess a highly refined apparatus of labor and slavery. A talented slave becomes free, then proceeds to oppress his former comrades.
Absolutely no one in the Empire wants to change this system. The very first thing slaves think about is the opportunity to gain power over other slaves.
It might seem that slavery is a primitive form of oppression and that financial dependency is more efficient, but one must understand that the Sith Empire utilizes droids and alchemy.
A Sith Lord is capable of performing genetic modifications and creating a specialized slave. A specific beast serves the role of a tractor or an all-terrain vehicle, while droids replace humans for monotonous work in the mines.
The flaws in the slave system only emerge during peacetime, but the Sith are constantly at war. Tulak Hord is a rather successful ruler; Alsakan helped the Empire avoid another civil war.
"Humans are irritating, as always."
Erra pointed at Imperial citizens selling their own children and relatives. I could also sense that the majority of these wretches possessed no talent for the Force.
The debt-slave fair was a way to get rich, and in the Empire, this was necessary to support a large slave population and increase demographic growth.
Propaganda claims that every Red Sith is Force-sensitive. This is far from the truth. The situation with humans is even worse: statistically, Force sensitivity occurs much less frequently among them.
The Sith Empire is a state where the Force-sensitive hold privileges, and as a result, a very bizarre attitude toward children has formed.
The Sith do not always sell their non-sensitive children into slavery, but humans actively engage in the practice. Force-sensitive citizens fear losing their privileged status.
To produce a talented child, some families make dozens of attempts, and the failures bring in good money. To Erra, this human behavior only confirms their genetic inferiority as a lesser race.
Her disdain is grounded in her own values and Imperial propaganda. Unfortunately, sentient beings are shaped by the society they live in, and these people are merely the product of their social relations.