Ginungagap

"'Every fire turns to embers. Every ember turns to ash. All ash turns to dust. I? I am what happens next.' - Ginungagap"Ginungagap, born Zelashiel, was an ancient Anzat and practitioner of Dark Side of Sith magics. He embraced the name Ginungagap, granted by superstitious primitives who thought him the embodiment of the primordial void, because he viewed himself as a black hole into which all the Force would one day drain.

Biography
Ginungagap was one of the most ancient Anzati on record, though he never explicitly stated what year, century, or even millennium he was born in. He was born as 'Zelashiel' somewhere between 9,000 and 12,000 years ago on the Anzati homeworld.

Journey's Start
Zelashiel became a Jedi some time around 12,000 BBY / 8,347 ATC. Unlike most Anzati, he refused to feed on sentients, as his significant Force potential allowed him to empathize too much with the few victims he had consumed. He joined the Jedi, feeding only on nonsentient livestock, and sought a way to satisfy his hunger more thoroughly through the Force.

After becoming a Jedi Master, Zelashiel began to scour the archives for means of rejuvenating oneself through the Force. After finding disappointingly little, he began his own explorations and experiments. The Jedi Council warned him not to tamper with the natural order, but he was determined to find a way to sate not just his own hunger, but that of his race. Anzati were thought of as creatures of the night, nightmares that hunted for living souls to the few who knew of them. Zelashiel believed that success in his journey would allow his species to leave that negative impression behind.

As he began to refine his approach, he dubbed the skills he was developing "Force Drain," and proudly presented his findings to the Council. They were horrified at his demonstration, where he used the force to shave an incremental amount of life force off of several volunteers. He was labeled a blasphemer against the sanctity of life and cast out of the Order entirely.

Newly exiled from his home with the Jedi, Zelashiel the Blasphemer chose to embrace a view of the Force more typical for an Anzat. As a member of the spacefaring and Force-using race, ancient to the point where they considered “the Force” to be a new name for an old phenomena, Zelashiel chose to explore aspects and uses of the Force that the Jedi would not condone or understand. His search led him into the Outer Rim, then into Wild Space, then into the Unknown Regions. His ship, though increasingly ancient, was reliable for a millennium. After it could be repaired no longer, Zelashiel found new vehicles and means of traveling the stars.

One with the Void
As the centuries passed, Zelashiel became less and less picky about how he used the powers he had developed, refining his technique further with every use. After a time, he had consumed enough Force energy that his own Force presence collapsed in on itself, and just like the embers of stars give life to black holes, this collapse birthed a void inside Zelashiel. His millennia of Force knowledge and experience allowed him not only to survive this change, but to thrive through it. Zelashiel learned to utilize the void at his core to further expand his Force Drain abilities. It also became a nearly-impenetrable Force defense, devouring most energy sent at him through the Force.

Name Earned
Not long after he had become a void in the Force, Zelashiel happened across a village on a primitive planet led by a council of elders who could touch the Force. They were intrigued by his Force presence, or lack thereof, and attempted to touch Zelashiel’s mind - to pierce the void. The elders committed too much of their power to the effort and one by one lost their minds to the void at his core, their sanity devoured. Several died, and the rest went mad. They raved for days about this stranger, this personification of the primordial void, before succumbing to exhaustion and death. Zelashiel was dubbed 'Ginungagap' after the primordial void in the villagers' mythos. He decided to settle there, accepting the moniker and bending the villagers and the neighboring towns to his will until they worshipped him. He had them build a temple home for him which he named Ma'ehmaq, meaning both "abyss" and "great knowledge" in the native tongue. He renamed the planet this as well and began to use it as a repository for his knowledge as well as a base from which to continue his explorations. In the known galaxy, only Ginungagap knew the location of Ma'ehmaq.

His time amongst the natives of Ma’ehmaq changed him further. The nature of his Force connection combined with their worship began to convince him that he truly was a literal manifestation of the primordial void. Ginungagap became obsessed with the idea that, one day, he would consume the last atom of matter in the universe and ensure its passing. Ginungagap’s goals became more focused. As before, he wanted to know everything about the Force and to live long enough to do so, but now he knew why he needed this knowledge. In order to consume the Force, Ginungagap would need to know all there was to know of it.

Only once did the people of Ma’ehmaq challenge Ginungagap. He had forced a population expansion to see if his experiments would be better served by having more servants. The growing population proved difficult to control as simply as a smaller population had been. The insurrection on Ma’ehmaq was brief, however, and Ginungagap quickly culled the population of his zealots back to a manageable number.

Uncovering a Threat
Other rituals he learned allowed him to invoke powerful visions, showing him distant events in the past, present, and many possible futures. Through these visions, Ginungagap learned much of the galaxy's past and stayed in touch with its present. One series of visions in particular both intrigued and concerned him. They centered on a human male, middle-aged, who seemed to be using a series of rituals to reach outside the universe and bring something back into it.

Ginungagap, who had previously never considered the idea of anything beyond this universe, became obsessed with the idea. He used rituals of his own to cast an illusory-yet-functional doppelganger of himself into the temple occupied by this man, whose name was Bahr’ve’ahz. Using this Force-double, Ginungagap explored some of Bahr’ve’ahz’s records in an attempt to learn more about these rituals.

In doing so, Ginungagap uncovered records of beings referred to as “Old Souls” that Bahr’ve’ahz seemed to worship. Delving deeper in the extensive portion of the archives under that heading, Ginungagap discovered that Old Souls, in way, sought to make the galaxy immortal. He also discovered first-hand accounts of the powers wielded by the Old Soul that Bahr’ve’ahz had served, Makhzor, and the existence of the multiverse. Realizing that his own nihilistic goals for reality were in danger, Ginungagap immediately ceased all other operations and took a small contingent of Ma’ehmaqi warriors with him to the world where Bahr’ve’ahz’s temple lay hidden, its secrets largely revealed already.

The battle that ensued was short but violent. Bahr’ve’ahz was more than powerful enough to decimate most of Ginungagap’s servants, but in doing so he showed Ginungagap that he was not strong enough for a one-on-one confrontation. Bahr’ve’ahz held his ground but eventually succumbed to Ginungagap’s assault. After a brief interrogation, Ginungagap granted Bahr’ve’ahz the mercy of a swift death.

His further explorations of the temple allowed him to dismantle and collect the various relics and rituals used to draw Shards of Makhzor from across the multiverse. Using the few Ma’ehmaqi warriors left alive, Ginungagap loaded the worthwhile relics and data storage units aboard his ship and returned to his own temple.

Discovering the Sith Imperium
While poring over the datafiles taken from Bahr’ve’ahz, Ginungagap learned about the Sith power the man had served: the Sith Imperium. Intrigued, Ginungagap read what he could of the Imperium’s history, working around the corrupted or destroyed files when necessary. After learning that Makhzor himself had served the Imperium, that the Imperium had interacted with and traveled through the multiverse, and of a dozen other unheard-of Force phenomena that the Imperium had encountered, Ginungagap decided to approach the Imperium. It was rare that someone else had knowledge to offer him, and he had more than enough to offer in return.

He divined the location of a scouting mission the Imperium would soon send out and went there to await them. After making contact, he demanded to be taken to Amgarrak, mentioning the secret world by name. The scouts did as he asked, and before an audience of the Imperium's Council he offered a trade - he would provide his knowledge and experience in a limited capacity, and in return asked to be granted access to the Imperium's histories and knowledge. Praetor Veldarius accepted the trade after Darth Azu'lae Roderick-Vizsla, Minister of State and daughter of the Emperor Arestenax, voiced her misgivings about the unorthodox arrangement, and Ginungagap spent several weeks exploring the archives. In this time, he made connections with several Imperium members, including Darth Azu'lae herself. He helped her to regain her connection the Force, and it returned seemingly stronger than before.

Attaining Power
Realizing there was much the Imperium could provide to him if his relationship to it were further formalized, Ginungagap requested another audience with the Council. In part thanks to the help he gave Azu'lae, and in part thanks to the knowledge he provided the Imperium, he was able to demand that he be given an open council seat. After a brief interjection by Prince Zendrasa, Ginungagap was given the position, and he became the Diocese of the Ministry of the One Sith, granting him authority in matters of religion, philosophy, and the Force and its instruction.

The Arcanum
Unbeknownst to the Imperium, Ginungagap had once briefly considered an outpost on a moon inside the Eridanus Nebula, not far from Amgarrak herself. It was a fully functional repository of most of the knowledge he had collected in his millennia of galactic and Force exploration, fully stocked with carbonite-frozen staff, guards, and test subjects, but he had never activated it. Now he had reason to do so, and his outpost on the moon Yad Shel'Rik became the headquarters of his ministry. He dubbed it Arcanum Verasis, and it was both university and fortress.

It was divided into three Archives. The Archive of Knowledge was open to most anyone, though there was some knowledge restricted to experienced apprentices and new Lords. The Archive of Power was open to experienced Lords and their betters, and the Archive of Mysteries was open only to Darths.

Reshaping Belief
Not long after Ginungagap was named Diocese, the Lord Emperor Arestenax began to break apart. His essence was split between his previous status as one with the Force yet conscious, and his new status as the reborn Emperor. The paradox of his binary existence threatened to shatter the universe until Shards of Makhzor appeared. Several Shards, acting in concert, seemed to talk to the Emperor, then disappeared with him. Other Shards revived the ghost of Keine Raam, founder and first Emperor of the Sith Imperium. He explained that the Imperium must vanish, as its Emperor had, but that the people of the Imperium would rebuild from the ashes - that their unity had been their strength, not their leaders.

In this vein, Ginungagap promised to create a new belief system and code for the Imperium to live by, then meditated for days on end in a Force-rich cave on Amgarrak. After days of intense meditation and introspection, Ginungagap emerged, speaking of the Tutai Qo, the "Forged Way," playing on the theme of flame that the Council had proposed for the empire's new title: Fireborn Sovereignty.

The Ministry of the One Sith became the Ashborn Covenant, with Ginungagap and his order focusing on ensuring the rebirth and immortality of the Sovereignty as a whole. Like the emblem of the new Sovereignty, the firebird, the Covenant would ensure that the Sovereignty never truly died; that it would always be reborn from the ashes.

Personality and Traits
Ginungagap lived for longer than some civilizations have existed and as a result tended to skip to the end of conversations when he knew the outcome. He cared little for individual lives. He watched so many beings die, and was the cause of such a large number of those deaths, that sentient life often appeared no more important to him than that of the grass he walked upon near the temple he called home.

Having consumed and destroyed so many Force-presences, and having his Force presence become a void, caused Ginungagap to believe that he had become the living embodiment of the void for which he was named. As he said to a Force-sensitive associate on their first meeting:"'Every light casts a shadow. Every wind creates a vacuum. The Force is not exempt from the laws of nature - I am inevitable.'"

Notable Traits
Ginungagap was not physically intimidating at first glance, aside from the variety of threatening and death-themed robes he often affected. He was short and thin to the point where one might describe him as frail. When he wore no mask, his face seemed to confirm this with his lanky white hair and scruffy white beard. His eyes were white with blindness, and visually he seemed to just be a very old man.

However, anyone who stood near him was able to feel something wrong with him. The air around him was cold, and grew colder the closer one was to him. With his ruined eyes he rarely looked directly at those around him, even when speaking to them, but many said that they could feel when his focus was on them - like a weight on their mind. If he chose to look directly at someone he was speaking to, this effect multiplied considerably.

Force-sensitives could generally pick up his Force presence quickly and easily. As a void in the Force, he felt unnatural and dangerous to anyone who could sense him. Those who tried to peruse his thoughts or pierce the void risked losing themselves to it, as the village elders he once met in Wild Space had done. Even if they were more cautious, there was generally a consistent tugging at the Force presence of anyone in close proximity to Ginungagap.

Philosophies
(Much of this is unknown to anyone but Ginungagap IC - avoid reading if that bothers you)

The Malleability of Reality
Ginungagap's explorations into the nature of the Force, informed by his existence as a void in it, shaped his views of this energy field and the reality most sentients took for granted. Given his extensive training in Jedi lore and techniques, the information he gathered from the old Sith Empire, and what he learned on his travels from numerous other traditions, he began to examine common truths and contradictions between them. In essence, most Force-using belief systems agreed that belief and conviction - in essense, willpower and imagination - were key to turning one's desires into reality.

Simplistic use of the Force, such as empowering the body, moving small objects with the mind, and bending the will of the weak-minded, was easier to accomplish because it was easier to believe it possible. Few Force-users of sufficient strength struggled to move pebbles, which they knew to be movable with their physical body. But broader or more complex usage, such as generating lightning or moving immense objects with the mind, strained the minds of initiates. Most could not lift a 2-ton boulder with their bodies, so they imagined it to be immovable and therefore were incapable of moving it. Practice and instruction could convince most Force-users that these acts were indeed possible, and once they accepted this as true, it became possible. Even instruction could only go so far, with few pupils daring to believe themselves capable of ascending beyond the limitations taught to them.

The universal acknowledgement and practice of this theme had vast implications. If the Force's only limitations were those placed on it by the limited imagination and rigid dogma of the sentients controlling it, then it could conceivably have no true limitations whatsoever. This was further evidenced by other seemingly-reality-defying abilities, such as teleportation and physical transformation. So Ginungagap concluded that, if one could truly convince one's conscious, subconscious, and unconscious mind of an act's possibility, then it would become possible.

It was this realization that led Ginungagap to conquer Ma'ehmaq's primitive and superstitious population. While he himself could accept this fact, at least on the surface, the fact that all Force-imbued beings had this reality-shaping ability meant that any manipulations by one individual could be prevented, collapsed, or otherwise undone by the sheer force of the combined conviction of the galaxy's sentients that nature had immutable laws. Therefore, to cement his newfound power, Ginungagap decided it would be beneficial to create a devoted following of sentients who likewise believed in his ability.

The forced population growth that resulted in the Insurrection was also connected to this realization. If Ginungagap could expand the number of believers, he could feasibly expand his power and his ability to manipulate 'reality'. However, as he'd suspected, trying to control too much at one time resulted in a natural backlash; as he'd tried to gather more Force energy to himself, the Force itself - or those who utilized and and were near enough to subconsciously feel the energy being gathered by someone else - reacted, ensuring the collapse of that effort.

The Truth Beneath the Façade
Perhaps of more import than the malleability of reality, though informed by it, was the truth of reality in Ginungagap's understanding. If all the physical world could be manipulated, altered, or undone with the power of will and belief, then he decided that none of it was truly real. The void at his core, the emptiness towards which all the universe was hurtling towards and from which it had sprung, gave form to the only truly immutable fact: that all things must end. Stars collapse and burn out, black holes evaporate, and light itself must eventually fade to nothingness.

Ginungagap believed, therefore, that somehow, from the midst of the Void, sentience and the Force had been created and given power over what was and what appeared to be. The physical universe and the energies that sprung from it were the construction of sentient minds rebelling at the concept of eternal nothingness, maintained and shaped by the minds of the living who feared death.

This was another cause for him to create and attempt to grow his following. If he could convince enough living, Forceful minds that the Void was the only truth there was, and (more importantly) that it was Ginungagap who would destroy the façade and bring emptiness to supremacy, then it would become true.

Having learned from his attempt to brute-force the process, Ginungagap accepted that longer-term manipulation was required. This would allow him to learn and absorb energy more subtly and in smaller increments, which would prevent the massive backlash he'd experienced before. It would also allow him to make use of natural entropy, allying himself with its gradual increase rather than attempting to force it to hurry along.