The Sith Who Refused To Die

Yes… of pain, he has learned much. Of knowledge, of teaching, he knows nothing.” Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords.

Have you ever heard the story of Darth Sion, the Lord of Pain? I thought not. It’s not a story the current Star Wars canon will tell you, at least, not yet. It’s a Legends story, specifically Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords. Darth Sion was a Sith Lord active during the Old Sith Wars. He had served under Exar Kun, but he would later serve under Darth Revan and Even Darth Traya before attempting to strike out on his own with a fellow sith. When you first look at him, you tend to notice one thing, Sion looks like a decaying corpse. That’s because he is.

When he was a Sith Marauder in Exar Kun’s Sith Empire, Sion would fight against many Jedi, expecting to die but always living, building up a tolerance to pain and eventually believing he was immortal. This view would come true when Sion was struck down during a fight against a Jedi. Rather than die, he got back up and killed the Jedi, discovering he could use the dark side of the Force to keep himself going at the cost of agonizing pain. Kun lost the Great Sith Wars, but Sion would outlive them all.

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Darth Sion would be found by another rising Sith, many years later, Darth Revan. Empowered by the Star Forge, Darth Revan’s Sith Empire would wage war with the galaxy once more, bringing a new age of conflict. It is unknown what role Sion had in this new empire, though we do know he spent some time at the Sith Academy on Korriban. There, he would watch as the remaining students turned on each other following the end of Revan’s Empire, a tragic, if fitting, end. Still, Darth Sion would survive and remain on the world, waiting for someone to arrive.

Soon enough, someone would arrive to find Darth Sion once more. Kreia, the Jedi Master to Revan, had turned to the dark side as Darth Traya and was looking for wounds in the Force. She found two, Darth Sion and the soon-to-be dubbed Darth Nihilus, The Lord of Hunger. Together, they would form a Sith Triumvirate, where they would begin to plan the destruction of the Jedi Order from the Trayus Academy on Malachor V. But soon, Traya would learn a valuable lesson, “To be united by hatred is a fragile alliance at best.” Sion and Nihilus would usurp her, strip her of her connection to the Force, and send her away. Eventually, Sion and Nihilus would go separate ways, committing a new purge on the Jedi Order.

Sion would eventually begin hunting down a surviving Jedi, Meetra Surik. Intercepting the Ebon Hawk, now in possession of Kreia, Darth Sion would manage to find Surik’s transport, the Harbinger, and boarded it by playing dead, allowing cloaked assassins to enter. Slaughtering the crew, Sion pursued Kreia and Surik to Peragus II, a mining world. As Surik and her new ally Atton Rand looked for an escape route, Sion dueled his old master and cut off her hand. The three would escape, however, leaving Peragus II to explode.

Sion would reencounter Meetra Surik two more times. On Korriban, Sion had captured Jedi Master Lonna Vash, killing her shortly before Surik could arrive. Engaging her in another duel, the Sith could not be beaten, so Surik fled. However, Sion began to feel conflicted feelings towards her and let her go. These feelings would dominate his mind for the remainder of his life, which was soon coming to an end.

After the death of Nihilus, Sion returned to Trayus Academy, where he once again encountered Kreia. Returning to her Darth Traya persona, she brought him back into her allegiance to test Meetra Surik. When Surik arrived, Sion engaged her. Unable to convince him of Traya’s true intentions, the two would have one final duel. Striking him down many times, Darth Sion would rise again, as he always had. However, Surik convinced him that his dark side power of immortality, which he once saw as a strength, was actually a weakness, making him dependent on the dark side. Finally letting go of his pain, Darth Sion gave into death and fell for the final time, thus concluding his story.

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Written by Ian Smith

Source(s): Wookieepedia

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