Far beyond Vale or the limits of any civilization, in a small clearing in the woods during the darkest hour of the night, sat a lone Maul on an old and worn tree stump, meditating against the gentle breeze of the forest. It was not a meditation to calm the mind and find peace, but one to fuel his connection and strength to the Dark Side. Fear, anger, hate, these would augment the power of a Sith such as himself, and they would grant him his penultimate goal one day. The Sith warrior would mostly use these times only to strengthen his spirit and bond to the Force, but seldom times he would reflect his time on Remnant.
This world… it truly was a world of bloody evolution among all others in the galaxy. Remnant was a fitting name for it- such a broken, chaotic, and fragile world that could recede to ruin at any wrong move. The world had a strong connection to the Force, attuned with it in such a unique way that he had never seen or heard of before. While Remnant leaned closer to the Dark Side, four nations and settlements scattered across the globe managed to live in relative peace despite the monstrous entities clawing at their walls. Those inside the barriers either lived in ignorance or believed that they could defeat the encompassing darkness of Remnant, the latter of which held faith in their Huntsmen.
Huntsmen, warriors sworn to defend the people of Remnant and keep the dark forces at bay… it nearly made the Sith scoff in disdain from the similarity they had to the Jedi. He didn't care for their cause or moral standards; no, instead he was more focused and almost entranced at how the Force formed a unique bond with each individual person. The first time he saw a Huntsman in action he could hardly believe the impossible act of the Force he saw. Their Auras, quasi-physical barriers that could defend against physical attacks, were almost identical to Force-barriers used by Jedi from the past, but the latter took a conscious effort to deploy and maintain and the user was limited in capabilities due to the amount of concentration it took to erect the barrier; Auras, however, could be activated like the flick of a switch, and furthermore the user wasn't limited at all in physical or mental capacities. What truly surprised the dark warrior was the fact that apparently all natives of Remnant were born with Auras; all they had to do was learn to activate it.
That alone would have made Darth Maul's arduous travel to this remote world worth it, but the real glory each Huntsman possessed was their own personal abilities, their Semblance. Even after months since his arrival, he still couldn't fathom why or how these people were blessed with such powerful abilities bestowed upon them by the Force. If such feats were displayed to other members of the known galaxy, even including surviving Jedi and likely the ancient Sith who knew the Force well, they would find these powers supernatural and beyond the realm of possibility. He almost thought that initially, too, but it's just like his old master taught him: nothing with the Force was impossible.
Yet, despite the seemingly strong connection the Huntsmen had to the Force, none of them could actually sense or use it in any way other than to operate their Semblances and to power Auras. Because of that and taking in their rather limited training into account; he'd discovered that their level of threat to him was close to an average Jedi Knight. His lifetime of training was already sufficient in combat and proved vastly superior to theirs, but it was a gleefully added touch that his lightsaber would eviscerate their Auras quickly and that they could not predict his movements in battle with the Force.
But Maul did not come to Remnant to wage war against the Huntsmen; it would be unwise to waste such a rare resource in the galaxy. Not just them, but Dust, Faunus, Grimm- so many more things he found and much more to discover that exist only on this rarest of jewels in all the planets of the galaxy. They were extraordinary resources of vast potential- all of Remnant was an untapped resource, and there was no competition to hinder the reaping of rewards. He was eager at the beginning to uncover all of the possibilities and what he could do for the future, but before he could start to plan ways of putting all of them in practical use, he would need to gather, study, and experiment with them, and as powerful as he was he was still just one man. Not only would he need certain ideal locations under his control, but he would also need a large workforce to aid him, to perform mandatory tasks and seizing other resources… he would need an empire
Fortunately, Maul had plenty of experience of running criminal empires, and he never planned to obtain any of his resources legally. So he did what he did best: conquer. Unlike the other criminal organizations he had taken over before, he was alone on Remnant, but that didn't discourage him. The entire takeover was like a snowball rolling into the size of a boulder: first he took control of one crime family, then took on a whole organization with new support, then two more organizations, then two doubled, then tripled, and then quadrupled. Before any of the crime lords knew it, Vale's underworld had suffered an absolute takeover with a Sith crowned as its ruler.
Vale was his primary target because it had powerful crime enterprises, strong connections to organizations of the other kingdoms, and easy access to Dust, but the main prize for the Sith was the man who would be invaluable for keeping productivity and efficiency maintained in his empire for when he was gone, Roman Torchwick. Although the dark warrior wouldn't boost the flamboyant man's ego further by telling him, Roman definitely met and even exceeded some of his expectations of operating the crime syndicate of Vale. It shouldn't have been a surprise; fear and greed drove him to produce the best results. Fear for death of the mute girl and greed for all the lien he could get. Maul was not concerned with lien very much, so he let them go to Roman to decide the distribution payment.
The crime syndicate in Vale had connections to the other kingdoms and his influence had already spread in the criminal underworld, so although he hadn't visited any of the crime enterprises in the other kingdoms yet, fear had driven them to cooperate and he could operate the syndicates in Vacuo and Mistral from afar. Just like with Roman, fear and greed had forced them into servitude to the Sith warrior. Atlas, on the other hand… well, although their tech was outdated compared to the Empire of the known galaxy, they still bolstered strength and numbers, and their general was forward thinking when dealing with threats, which was to outgun and outnumber them. Maul didn't care to fight Atlas at the moment, especially considering they had little to offer him, but he knew Roman had a few connections there, so if the need came he could obtain whatever he needed from Atlas.
A deep, guttural growl emanated before him. He calmly opened his eyes to see a massive beast of a bear, ashen black skin with a bony-white exoskeleton protecting the face and dotting its shoulders and knees, razor claws on its toes and equally sharp teeth packed in its drooling maw, and searing red eyes blazing with fury. Grimm; specifically, an ursai stood a dozen yards before him. He smiled. Not a sadistic, cunning, or cruel smile he had done so much before, but the same smile an art critique would have when laying their eyes upon the beauty of a masterpiece. Yes, these Grimm were beautiful creatures. Not physically, of course, but the dark warrior saw the beauty of what they were.
They were not just mindless beasts striving for survival or competition; no, they were so much more. They were responsible for nearly all the Dark Side energy emitting from Remnant, and it emitted from them because they were living culminations of the Dark Side itself. There was only the darkness in them; anger, hatred, pain, it's all their life was. Grimm ate only for the sake of sadistic entertainment, competed against animals and races only for strife, and slaughtered the innocents only because it was their harsh desires. Life has existed before that acted as conduits of the Force, just like the Jedi and Sith, but the Grimm weren't conduits of the Dark Side. They were the Dark Side incarnate.
Out of everything Remnant had to offer, these beasts of darkness were by far the most alluring and greatly surprising. Just like with everything else on this strange planet, Maul didn't know how or why the Grimm came to be. He had heard of old folklore and tales describing their origins, but nothing concrete was discovered and the Force hadn't provided any insight of their birth. Perhaps he would discover their origins at a later point, but if he didn't then it would not matter. Where they came from was irrelevant for his plans; what mattered was that they even existed in the first place.
The ursai pawed at the ground with its right leg, its glare focused solely on him. Darth Maul gently sighed before slowly standing, his artificial knee-caps producing metallic clicks as he rose to his full height. The Grimm were also unique in that not only did they hold massive amounts of Dark Side energy within them, but they could collectively sense the Dark Side or anything that would produce it leagues away from its source. Most of the time, these sources were the bitter emotions caused by groups of people. So, naturally, a Sith would draw them in like moths to a beacon of light.
The creature's maw overflowed with drool as it crouched down into an offensive stance and unleashed a ravenous, deadly roar that tore through the gentle night. Branches and foliage swayed and Maul's robes flapped behind him, but he remained unmoving, unafraid. With a calm expression, the dark warrior reached down across his belt and unhilted his weapon: a lightsaber, his latest one that was built from parts of an Inquisitor's own. He gripped it with his right hand at his side, deactivated and held upward. Maul took no defensive stance since it wouldn't be required for an ursai.
Waiting no longer, the beast charged forward with another furious roar. The ground rumbled with each charging step, but Maul stood his ground, unnerved. The beast was upon him in no time, raising its right paw high in the air to strike down the seemingly feeble man. But before the beast knew it, the dark warrior leapt up into the air past him with his weapon cracking to life during his ascent, flipping and landing behind the beast with his feet and free hand, the other now holding his activated weapon, emitting the surrounding area in a bloody crimson glow.
A soft thud impacted the ground behind Maul, and he idly glanced behind him to see the head of the beast, lifeless red eyes and smoke sifting from the cut of the neck. The body abruptly fell on its side, joining the lifeless head. With the glow of his blade, he turned and studied what remained of the beast. A minute of silence later, flakes broke off of the beast and drifted away in a silent wind, disintegrating into the night. The rest of the body plus head followed suit, and then nothing remained as if the ursai never existed to begin with. It was yet another mystery of the Grimm, of why their deaths always resulted in this. Maul theorized that, being creatures of the Dark Side, their bodies couldn't maintain the energies held within them after death and so the darkness they carried would disappear from the physical realm and integrate into the Force, possibly to be recycled in the creation of more Grimm. It was still just a theory, though.
Darth Maul decided he had meditated and reflected enough; it was time for him to get back to his mission. He had a place to be and no time to waste on these creatures. He took a few steps forward before halting. "Ah," he spoke smoothly, "the rest of the pack has decided to come and play." He sensed their presence before he saw the dozens of pairs of eyes breach through the darkness of the forest. Growls on all sides emanated and the beasts stalked into his vision to reveal them being beowolves. More and more Grimm crawled menacingly from the trees and brush, forming a circle around Maul, the radius of space slowly closing. The Sith merely sighed. "I have more important business to attend to, but," he held his still activated lightsaber in front of him, the blade being parallel to the ground.
Kzzzhhht!
A twin crimson blade erupted from the other end of his weapon. Maul gripped his lightsaber with both hands now, slowly spinning his staff in a circle, the blades humming from the movement. The beasts were only momentarily halted from the rupture of a second blade, but with a collective angry growl they continued their advance toward him. Maul's rotation of his lightsaber steadily accelerated until the hums of the blades became more violent and the blades seemed more like one vicious flash of red. And without any further warning, Maul spun on his legs and hurled the spinning blades forward, ripping through the air and meeting its targets head on.
On a hilltop that peaked high into the night sky, three figures stood there. The one in front, a beautiful woman dressed in red with gold lining and short, loose black hair, studied the kingdom of Vale at the edge of the horizon with her calculating amber eyes. "It's like my father said, 'if you want to know a city,'" a younger teen stepped up to her right, donned a predominantly steel-grey and black vest and combat suit with grown-out equally grey hair. He crossed his arms as he also looked down upon the distant city, "'go find the rats.'"
"And who better than the biggest rat of all?" Another teen, this one female, with maroon eyes, short and light emerald hair, darker skin tone and less dressed than the others stepped up to the woman's other side. The woman chuckled. She knew exactly who they were referring to. The man in control of Vale's criminal society. She looked above the city to see the crack of dawn slowly emerging across the skyline.
"Come," she calmly commanded as she began to walk toward the city, her two lackeys quickly following behind, "let's see what good Roman can do for us."
Another wave of saltwater crashed into the side of the old wooden boat, spraying Maul across his face and body. He grunted and squinted his eyes as he wrestled the water with both oars to keep the raft from strafing off course. Nothing but the smell of saltwater and sounds of crashing waves accompanied a somewhat drenched Maul. More than half a day had passed since his meditation the previous night, and he now found himself relying on the most basic form of technology even by Remnant's standards, a wooden boat with oars, traversing the shaky waters far away from the remote beach he had departed from. Though it was still morning, the sky was a dreary, depressing grey all around, and a thin layer of fog was beginning to build up, limiting Maul's vision more than it already was. Not that he needed it now. He could feel it before he saw it, the place that had barely called to him in a distant echo the closer he got and felt like clear shouting now that he could see it.
Past the crashing waves, through the low and thin fog, the dark warrior could see it: a tiny rock island standing high above the waves, no bigger than a few city blocks bunched together. It was the only other thing that stood out from the ocean for miles, protruding high from it as if the presence held within it refused to be submerged. He fought the waves tirelessly until the Sith eventually reached his destination and his boat harshly dragged up along the jagged stone beach; still good enough for a return trip. He set the oars in the boat and clambered out before walking up to the cliffs surrounding the beach before him. Glancing up, he saw that the cliff was only a little more than a few stories high.
Darth Maul crouched his legs low and then leapt up and propelled himself upward as the wind raced past him. He grasped the ledge of the cliff with both hands while his feet landed against the cliff. With a grunt, he lifted himself up and swung his legs over onto the ledge and rose up. He was a little soaked, but he hardly cared about any discomfort as he gently lowered his hood with both hands. A sigh of relief overtook him. After a long journey on foot and boat, he finally found what he was looking for. Sure, he could have taken some other, easier mode of transportation like his own ship, but he didn't dare take any chances of anyone finding this but himself. He hadn't known that it was on an island; his map was very outdated and unspecific, but it had taken him where he needed to be.
Before him stood a rubble of masonry, four decrepit, black granite walls made of large stone cubes connected together as a square with their condition so bad that holes covered almost all the surfaces that it was a wonder how they were still standing. Whether they were always black or the ages had corroded their true colors, the Sith couldn't tell. The tallest wall only came to be a few feet taller than Maul while the rest varied in height. The length of each one was equal, about the length of a large house. Stone was carved out from the island and ran along the base of the walls, likely holding a sleek appearance a millennia ago, but now the elements had eroded it, leaving only an impression of what it once was.
Darth Maul studied the layout for a second more before raising his head up to the cloudless, meek sky. At one point in an ancient bygone age, he would have seen a dark tower piercing the skies of Remnant, a foreboding warning to every living thing in sight. But now, the structure was only a shadow of what it once was ages ago. Bringing his gaze back down, he curiously approached the brown, rusted steel door in the center of the nearest wall. It, like the rest of the structure, was likely going to crumple to pieces if he wasn't careful. When he was in front of the door, he slipped off the leather glove from his left hand and ever so gently ran his fingers across the granite wall and then the rusted door. He brought his hand up to see it stained grey and black from the dust that had collected over time. Humming thoughtfully, he placed his right hand on the door and gave a gentle push. The door remained firm at first, but with a little more pressure the hinges creaked as the door barely tittered open. Stepping inside, he looked around but saw little difference. The floors were the same stone material as the island, the walls weren't any different from the inside and-
He stopped.
His eyes slightly widened as his sight was locked at the wall left of the door. He turned and approached the wall, squinted his eyes, and smiled once confirming what he was looking at: text. Most of it was eroded away like the rest of the tower, but the script was large and still recognizable in its language. Not basic or any language Remnant had. It was Sith.
He could only make out a few words, like 'dedication' and 'art' but no coherent sentences could be read nor could the dark warrior guess at what it meant. He decided he would try to decipher the rest later as he turned back to the center of the room. Stepping forward, his eye caught something in the center of the room. Slowly advancing forward, he looked at the floor to see rectangular steel fitted smoothly into the ground, about the size of a table. What struck him as odd was that this steel's condition was fine and not rusted unlike the door. There were no seams or hinges or anything to suggest it was a trapdoor of some kind, but Maul knew better.
The dark warrior closed his eyes and reached his arm outward to the trapdoor. Exhaling, he felt the Force guide him through the ancient locking mechanisms beneath him, and as he unlocked each one he could hear muffled banging and clicking noises reverberating through the rock. Finally, a sharp bang resonated under the steel door. Opening his eyes, Maul could see a horizontal seam had appeared, then the door split and steadily grinded in opposite directions, disappearing under the stone floor. The grinding noise stopped soon after, then Maul saw that the trapdoor had covered an old stone staircase leading down into an abyss.
Maul usually wasn't quite as thrilled by what the ancient Sith had done like his former master was obsessed about it, but he couldn't keep an eager grin off of his face. This was the first true step in his plan. He unclipped his lightsaber and a blade hissed to life. And he stepped down into the darkness, eager and curious about the ancient secrets and knowledge he would soon discover.