The chamber was silent.
Not in fear. Not in surrender.
The New Galactic Senate rebuilt after years of war stood beneath the vaulted ceiling of the Unity Spire, eyes locked on one figure.
Chancellor Padmé Amidala, her cloak dark, her face lined not with age, but with the weight of decision.
Behind her stood Bail Organa, Mon Mothma, and a dozen planetary representatives who bore scars of old wars. To her left, Jedi Masters. To her right, generals.
Projected in the air between them: Serion's terms. Still burning. Still echoing with that same terrible voice:
"You were given a choice."
Padmé stepped forward. Her voice rang with clarity.
"We were shown a path to slavery. Not survival. We were given fear and called it peace. I remember peace. I remember what it cost."
She paused.
"And I refuse to surrender to ghosts."
Silence.
Then thunderous agreement.
"We fight," Bail declared.
"We fight," said Mon Mothma.
And so did the people. Across sectors. Across divisions. Systems once torn by war stood together. Separatists. Republic loyalists. Rebel colonies. Even criminal syndicates. The galaxy had never been so unified because there was no future without resistance.
The call went out.
All ships to muster. All sabers to light. All hope to arms.
In the icy void of the Outer Rim, Darth Vader stood aboard the Executor-class Annihilator, gazing at the holo feed of the Senate's decision.
Behind him, his last loyal armadas The Crimson Line, The Black Moon Armada, The Wraith Phalanx stood ready. His clone-forged dreadnoughts hummed with anticipation.
His mechanical breathing slowed.
"She chose war," he said aloud.
Admiral Viin stepped forward. "What are your orders, my lord?"
"Prepare to die."
He turned to the fleet.
"All of you."
From deep in the Unknown Regions, a scream tore across hyperspace a dark pulse, ancient and cruel.
Exegol opened.
And out of it came the impossible.
Palpatine returned.
But not as before.
Not as a crumbling shadow, but as a perfected tyrant, bound into a vessel of cloned fury and arcane design. His fleet: The Red Eclipse, forged in secret for decades. Vessels shaped like daggers, running on Kyber-fed fusion reactors. Sith Star Destroyers twenty kilometers long, bleeding red lightning from their hulls.
The galaxy recoiled.
Serion watched from the Void Throne.
Suspended in orbit above the corpse of the Yuuzhan Vong galaxy, the throne was not a seat it was a device. A conduit. A binding place of wills. It fed from the Mortis Gate, from the World Engine, and from the souls that had been burned to make his truth possible.
Around him floated millions of ships dreadnoughts, interdictors, spectral skirmishers. Fleets without name, forged in silent systems powered by the death of stars.
His voice echoed across the silent neural field that bound his commanders.
"I gave you peace. You chose extinction."
He raised one hand.
The War began.
The Sentinels rose first massive humanoid war-machines powered by Seed-cores, extracted from the dying heart of the Force itself. Each Sentinel towered over cities, impervious to blaster fire, unstoppable without focused Force manipulation.
Next came the Reforged Mandalorians a thousand war-brothers born from shattered clans, led by a living myth:
Jango Fett.
Clad in reforged beskar-onyx armor, with an army rebuilt in Serion's image, Jango descended upon the mid-rim battlefields like death incarnate, flanked by drop-jets and dark-rider mechs.
Each Mandalorian bore a single insignia:
"No More Creed. Only War."
Entire star systems ignited.
Kuat fell under orbital bombardment.
Naboo repelled three consecutive invasions, its swamps turned into trenches where Force-trained gungans fought beside Jedi initiates.
Coruscant's orbit shattered, massive orbital plates crashing into the lower levels, defended by Republic and Sith alike. The Final Defense Grid activated for the first time in centuries.
But just when despair crept in when the galaxy began to tilt toward oblivion
The Light answered.
Across the stars, cloaked ships emerged unregistered, unsignaled. Their insignia: a star within a flame.
From them came warriors not seen in decades. Hidden Jedi. Exiled masters. Gray-knights and temple ghosts. They had stayed away for years, believing balance impossible.
Now, they returned.
At their head stood a figure thought long vanished.
Master Yoda.
Aboard a Jedi dreadnought forged from the roots of Ilum's old core, he stepped into the light, cane in hand, saber at his side.
"Long we waited. Too long. But ends must come."
And from his fleet, the New Jedi Order emerged an alliance of ancient survivors and Force-children born after the Fall.
Luke Skywalker walked beside him.
Leia Organa ignited her blade for the first time in years.
Rey, from the ashes of Jakku, joined with the saber of Skywalker in hand.
Every Jedi blade in the galaxy lit at once.
A thousand points of light in the darkness.
Serion leaned back on the Void Throne, eyes distant.
"They remember," he whispered. "Too late."
Then to his fleets: "End them."
The final convergence began.
From the Gate poured dreadnoughts rivers of metal, guided by predictive AI and Force-simulation oracles.
The Republic, the Imperials, the Hidden Jedi, and the Sith remnants stood united not by alliance, but by necessity.
Every system burned.
Every fleet clashed.
Every legend returned.
In the skies over Mortis, where the Gate screamed and the World Engine pulsed, the final battle for reality itself began.
On one side: the galaxy every banner, every belief, every broken promise, united by the refusal to be erased.
On the other: Serion who had waited in shadow, who had crafted war from silence, who had told them what would happen, and was simply fulfilling the prophecy they refused to heed.
The Force surged with agony and light.
And through it all, across the void, Serion's voice echoed like judgment carved into time:
"I gave you terms.You chose fire.Then burn."