Welcome back to Brennan’s Breakdowns of the new novel Star Wars Supernatural Encounters by Joe Bongiorno.
And in the sixth episode of the series and the first episode of 2024, we’ll be covering Supernatural Encounters chapter 4! Chapter 4 is found on pages 36 to 41, and these are 5 amazing pages. Here’s your final spoiler warning, now let’s get into a brief summary of the contents of this chapter. This entire chapter is the 4th Manuscript Reading at the Historical Council chambers, as we know Hari Seldona is reading every word of this chapter to the room full of supporters and skeptics.
The words she’s reading were written of course by Arhul Hextraphon, who here recounts past events, the specifics of what he’s looking to discover and discern as a Historian, and the setup to his journey into the discoveries he will make, including recounting the first moves he will make. He will recount the first planets he will visit, and this is where it’ll cut-off. Now let’s break this thing down chapter by chapter!
Arhul starts off by saying that he is aware that many of his historian colleagues will scoff at really everything he has to say. He acknowledges that his respectability and character will be subject to discussion and debate. Which ultimately as we have seen in the Historical Council Debate section, we know to be the case. Arhul’s writings pretty much spot on predict what the reaction by the historical and scientific community in this opening paragraph of the chapter.
Arhul says that his fascination with the ancient past started when he was a child. And that it had died down to embers over the years, until it was sparked back to blazing life with the incident on Alashan. As mentioned in the previous Breakdown in this series, the planet Alashan comes from Star Wars Weekly number 107 in the story World of Fire. The incident on Alashan that he refers to, is basically the entire story arch of World of Fire, as well as two following story arcs called The Word for World is Death and The Guardian of Forever which are found in respectively Star Wars Weekly number 110 for the former and Star Wars Weekly number 113 for the latter.
In the next paragraphs Arhul basically surmises the events of that comic storyline, mentioning some specific names that originated there. Such as once again mentioning the City of Forever and mentioning the Rebel sidekick on the mission to Alashan Mici Shabandar. Arhul mentions that she went with Luke and Leia, and were confronted by a powerful killer intelligence left by the Alashanians. The Alashanians are then name given to the extinct and long vanished original species that lived on Alashan.
The Alashanians did not previously have an official designation before here with Supernatural Encounters establishing the species name. The killer intelligence left behind is a reference to the Sentinel also called the Guardian of Forever, a reptilian creature with great powers that killed several of the Rebels with Luke, Leia, and Mici during the comics events. Arhul mentions that Leia who had studied the late Professor Arn Horada’s methods, was able to decipher the Alashanian’s hieroglyphics from the comic. Arn Horada doesn’t appear in the comic that Arhil is recounting, but instead is a historian that was pulled from the original Marvel Star Wars comic number 30. He was depicted there as a renowned historian and professor who it was said had personally tutored Leia during her adolescence.
If you read the World of Fire comic arch by itself, it’s kind of unbelievable to read how fast Leia is able to decipher ancient alien writings. But with the re contextualization of her having a genius as her teacher in the past as we know to be true, it makes the original comic seem more in perspective as possible. We are told that Alashan means People of the Wing and Foremost Ones, which draws a connection to another species. Arhul speculates that the unfamiliar reptilian people depicted in the ancient Alashan culture, could be the offspring of the S’kytri species. Which implies a connection between the Alashanians and the S’Kytri. The S’Kytri first appeared in Star Wars Annual #1 from Marvel comics.
The species also prominently appeared in Abel G Pena’s Skyewalkers novel and the Lost Tribe of the Sith: Spiral comic book miniseries.
This is the first instance of something I love that happens over and over in this book. And this is recontextuailzation and connections. Take two previously existing concepts from the Star Wars EU, and kind of link them in a genius way that makes so much sense. We will see this over and over again, and I absolutely adore this effort to make the vastly different concepts from across the amazing Star Wars EU all kind of tied neatly together. Brilliant stuff!
Arhul then mentions that the hieroglyphs Leia deciphered depicted an ancient calamity and an ancient monstrous conflict. He postulates that this is during a concept known as The Cosmic Wars; which we will find out a ton about in later chapters. It is an early primitive galaxy-wide epic brawl amongst the primeval species in the ancient stars. And I can’t wait to talk more about it. Arhul says here that the Cosmic Wars is an unknown event from the ancient past, that resulted in several species fled, disappeared, or went extinct. The list includes the Ahra Naffi, the Arbrans, the Eellayins, the Indur, the Osserians, the Killiks, the Kwa, the Cocytans, the original Yavin inhabitants and more.
The Ahra Naffi species comes from Michael P. Kobe McDowell’s Black Fleet Crisis Trilogy book 1: Before the Storm. Where they are mentioned as an ancient species that would eventually become the Qonet species who then became the modern day Qella species as of 17 ABY.
The Arbrans come from Original marvel Star Wars issue number 67. There they are depicted as a super ancient alien species that had to flee their homeward after their negative emotions conjured up a green being called The Darker. I personally believe that the Arbrans, probably appeared the same physically as that of The Darker for the most part. Later EU works fleshed them out to where it was established that the Arbrans, before they disappeared existed concurrently with the ancient tyrant Xim the Despot. It was also later postulated in the EU that they had a similar language to the ancient Sith species. So we already had a fairly in-depth base of ancient knowledge surrounding this species, so of course they were going to get mentioned here in Supernatural Encounters!
Next species mentioned were the Eellayin who come from James Luceno’s Revenge of the Sith Visual Dictionary as well as the Complete Locations sourcebook. They are fleshed out there as the ancient species that lived on the planet Polis Massa, but they mysteriously were blasted out of existence leaving little trace behind. Afterwards the Kallidahin aka Pollis Massans swooped in and settled the empty world. Nice that they got mentioned here too.
Our next species are the Indur, who are an original species to Supernatural Encounters, hailing from ancient Endor. But we’ll find out a lot more about them and their impact in much later chapters.
After the Indur, we get a shout to the Osserians, which are named for the first time here. They hail from the planet Osseria, which is the name Supernatural Encounters gives to the previously unnamed Outer Rim planet The Keeper’s World. The Keeper’s World, now known to be Osseria comes from the short comic storyline The Keeper’s World which spanned the comic magazine Pizzazz in split up parts from issue number 1 to issue number 9. In that comic the planet is mostly wilderness and barren, but hints that the Osserians once existed is shown by ancient crumbling structures, that shows evidence of a past civilization, named here for the first time. Which will be expanded extensively in the following chapters of this work.
After that we get another shout to the Killiks who had disappeared from the galaxy and then reemerged recently with Dark Nest as is mentioned in the opening Prologue of the book. The Killiks are mentioned 47 times in this work, so I may as well stop making note of every time they show up. I love having the constant Killik nods in this work.
After the Killiks, the Kwa species are referenced here in this list too. The Kwa chase their EU origin back to Dark Horse’s Star Wars 1998, when they appeared in issue number 24 which is apart of the Infinity’s End arch. The Kwa appeared prominently afterwards throughout the EU, including in the Dawn of the Jedi comics, SWTOR, Clone Wars Secret Missions, The Last Jedi novel, and a heap of sourcebooks.
Finally in the list named are the Cocytan species.The Cocytan species come from a LucasArts sci-fi point and click video game called The Dig. The Dig’s story was initially pitched as a story for an anthology series by Steven Spielberg called Amazing Stories. But due to technological limitations, Spielberg gave the idea to LucasArts, who turned it into a game.
The Cocytans come from the planet Cocytus, but they have another name we will learn later on. Star Wars author Alan Dean Foster wrote a novelization of The Dig video game, where the Cocytan were first mentioned in print. I think the Cocytan are a fascinating species and it’s an interesting background story on them. Their appearance is so bonkers, I love them; and am thrilled to think that they existed out there in the past history of Star Wars.
Arhul also mentions that the ancient original inhabitants of Yavin 4, who presumably left behind some of the ruins spread across the planet. There have been several species in the EU who resided on Yavin 4, even in ancient times, such as the Critokians from Galaxy Magazine number 7 and the Millennium Falcon novel or Naga Sadow’s Sith group from the Tales of the Jedi comics. But neither of those species are likely the original inhabitants.
After the list we have yet another mention of the Rakata species from Knights of the Old Republic. What’s wild is that we are told here that perhaps the Rakata’s Infinite Empire which we have long heard was the first dominant force in the ancient galaxy, is maybe not that big a deal. Arhul speculates that the Rakata were indeed an ancient species but that their boasts of their great empire were exaggerated and they were just an associated pawn race serving greater unseen evils. This reframing of the history of Star Wars as we know it is fascinating, to think of bigger evils at play using the great Rakata as pawns is terrifying. What could be lurking in the ancient past? Well we will find out.
Here is where we get our second Hexnote, which is regarding how he believes the dates Historians ascribe to the Rakata and Infinite Empire’s dominance is perhaps erroneous and in error. So perhaps their undisputed long reign was greatly exaggerated in scale and magnitude in relation to the dates ascribed to their feats. It’s a fascinating Hexnote, as Arhul speculates that not every ancient date given by scholars is erroneous. But he believes discernment is required, because the integrity of the ancient record-keepers may need to be determined before trusting such dates.
Arhul then speculates on how it seems impossible that Leia, even with some background on such things from her time under the tutelage of Professor Horada, was able to decipher the ancient Alashanian people’s writings. It strikes him as impossible that she was able to do this so quickly. There is almost no way she could decipher such old hieroglyphs. Arhul does state somewhat comedically here that for the record the former Chief of State was incredibly brilliant.
Mentioning Leia as the former Chief of State is a position that Leia first attained in Kevin J. Anderson’s novel Champions of the Force. She became chief of state as Mon Mothma stepped down. Leia would step down and return to power several times, serving as Chief of State of the New Republic from 11 ABY to 17 ABY, with a brief interim from former Chief of State Mon Mothma again in 17 ABY, before resigning in 18 ABY in correlation with the Corellian Trilogy. She would succeed Chief of State Ponc Gavrisom who was in office for the Hand of Thrown duology, by returning to office from 21 ABY to 23 ABY. Her stepping down was first established in RA Salvatore’s New Jedi Order: Vector Prime, which established that she had stepped down in 23 ABY and Borsk Fey’lya was her successor. I think it’s interesting that Arhul refers to her as our former Chief of State.
In the next paragraph it mentions the age before the discovery of Hyperspace. And the belief that civilizations from that time evolved independently from one another given that there wasn’t the technology supposedly to traverse the stars between worlds. The advent of hyperspace was discussed in a short story for the first time in 1996’s Tales of the Jedi companion, which included a short story by George R. Strayton called The Advent of Hyperspace Travel. My good friend Marcel also known as the Revanchist has a reading of this short story set sometime before 25,000 BBY on his YouTube channel for those interested in it.
Arhul mentions how historians have their own niches and specialties, which prevents them from seeing patterns and crossover between cultures. His example of that is that historians who study Killik writings will only study Killik writings, and thus won’t study the writings of other ancient species such as the Ahra Naffi and Eellayin. Arhul says that because of the lack of belief of alien cultures meeting up before the hyperdrive, many ancient artifacts are marked as post hyperspace travel, when they come from perhaps way before that. Arhul here seems to be suggesting that ancient aliens did indeed have interaction with each other even before the hyperdrive. Which is a fascinating concept we will see expanded upon much more later on in the work.
This is when Arhul reveals that Leia was able to decipher the heirogylphs so easily, because the Alashanian language bares a striking similarity to the written language of the ancient Kwa, which leads to speculation that a common language existed between the two species which historians previously had believed did not come into contact with each other. It was thought impossible. And yet as Arhul reflects on page 38, no major overhaul or changing of the historical texts. No discussion even about the crazy implications of this discovery is even had. Despite it being known about for 30 years, the scientific and historical community are too set in their ways to acknowledge the perhaps galaxy shattering discovery.
Arhul then references a Supernatural Encounters original character named Yman Veli’kosyk, who’s an in-universe writer, whose quote we first encountered at the beginning of chapter 1. As discussed in my chapter 1 breakdown, Yman Veli’kosyk is a reference to the real world Russian pseudoscientist Immanuel Velikovsky. As I speculated last time I believe in universe due to the name structure Yman Veli’Kosyk is probably a Bothan or Camaasi. Nice to encounter him again here, as well as another new in-universe character named Rol Aviid. Rol Aviid is an anagram of real world Egyptologist David Rohl.
I love how Supernatural Encounters pays homage to real world historians, scholars, and scientists; with these name anagrams for the brilliant minded in universe characters. Brilliant stuff as always. It’s mentioned that Aviid and Veli’Kosyk’s work and suggestions have undergone intense scrutiny by the Society of Intergalactic Studies, which I believe is a new organization that appears here for the first time. It isn’t all bad news for the academics here though, as Arhul notes that he is heartened that as of late there work is being considered at all.
Kwa Star Temples are mentioned in the next paragraph, which originated with the Kwa species in the Infinity’s End comic book arch. Arhul notes that there is a correlation between the Alashanian hieroglyphs and the Kwa language, as well as Zeffonian tombs and the ancient languages and writings of other ancient species. The Zeffonian species first came from the video game Jedi: Fallen Order.
Arhul references the Great Library of Ropagu, which is a Great Library located on the planet Ropagi 2. The Great Library contained thousands of years of history in its archives, curated by the near-human Ropagu people. The Great Library and the Ropagu species as well as the planet Ropagi 2 all come from The Twin Stars of Kira West End Games sourcebook by Greg Farshtey.
Arhul mentions that the Great Library mentions the portals known as Infinity Gates. An ancient means of transformation across the cosmos, that were first referenced in Marvel Star Wars #24. After that within the EU, Infinity Gates prominently appeared in Dawn of the Jedi and The Clone Wars: Secret Missions, amongst a slew of source material.
Arhul mentions how it was through these Infinity Gates that ancient species like the Kwa has been able to contact other alien races. This is where we learn some names for the ancient alien races, which will continue to be referred to by these titles throughout the rest of the work. The ancient first sentient alien people were dubbed The Firstborn, First Ones, Precursors, Ancients, and Elder Races. All suitably ancient mythic sounding names. Among the first people that the Kwa were said to have contacted were the Gree. The Gree species are known as an ancient people and appeared throughout the EU, known as this ancient wise race. The insectoid people first appeared in Adventure Journal number 8, in the article The Gree Enclave. Arhul even mentions the Gree Enclave by name and mentions that he visited apart of the Gree Enclave.
The planet Asation which appeared in The Old Republic video game in addition to the original Adventure Journal number 8 article. The Gree’s giant city ships also come from that article, and here Arhul mentions that he rode on one of these ships once he reached Asation. The ride on the city-ship led him to standing before The Guild Council, he says. The Guild Council was a high organization of a select group of Gree masters that comes from Adventure Journal number 8.
Arhul says that he stood before them by the arches of the Satikan. The Satikan is the largest Gree city on Asation which traces its origins back to The Gree Enclave, and additionally appeared in the HoloNet News Vol 531 number 54 article titled “Dooku Spotted in Gree Enclave”.
It was there in the city before the elders that Arhul observed an ancient Gree hypergate, which as we learn throughout Supernatural Encounters have a clear link to the Infinity Gates of the Kwa. The Hypergates were ancient wondrous devices of transport from The Age of Vernal Splendor. A time we will learn a lot about much later on in the work. The Gree Hypergate first appeared in the West End Games adventure supplement Graveyard of Alderaan by Bill Slavicsek. Arhul knows that the elder Gree had unfortunately not chosen to pass the secrets of the miraculous technology down to the current Gree, and he knows he will sadly not be able to learn whatever the Guild Council does know, unless he makes it worth there while. So he is prepared.
At the end of page 38 we get our third Hexnote, this Hexnote mentions that the Asation city’s name is a word that comes from the language of the ancient Kwa and ancient Alashan species language. Showing the early connections between species. The word Asation means essentially Sanctuary, a fitting name. And the Gree people’s name even had a meaning to the ancient Kwa and Alashan language, as it means People of Goodwill. An incredibly fascinating feature of this book, is that we do delve into a lot of the language root breakdowns of words and meanings in the ancient tongues of the galaxy. This is our first instance of that with this Hexnote.
On page 39 we learn that Arhul’s gamble has paid off, as the Guild were happy to answer Arhul’s questions and offer any knowledge they had once he gave them an ancient antique relevant to the Gree people. The artifact being the Khoz’zhak, which first appeared in Adventure Journal number 8. Arhul mentions that his friend Corellia Antilles had stolen the object many years prior. This information comes from Adventure Journal number 14, in the article From the Files of Corellia Antilles. Corellia Antilles herself has already appeared in previous chapters of this book, and she traces her origin back to West End Games material, though she appeared later throughout the entire EU. Arhul mentions how the Te Hasan Gree, from the planet Te Hasa within the Gree Enclave had gotten the artifact back from Antilles originally. Which we knew from the two aforementioned Adventure Journal stories.
But now in Supernatural Encounters, it mentions that they gave it back to her in secret without the rest of the Enclaves knowledge as they wanted her to decrypt it. This leads to our fourth Hexnote which mentions that they did this, as they knew what a skilled Decrypter Corellia was from a popular holoseries based on her adventures called The Corellia Antilles Files. I believe that the actual existence of an in-universe holoseries is an original concept to Supernatural Encounters. As previously the article From The Files of Corellia Antilles was just an excerpt from a lecture series she had done to interested people at the Galactic Museum, and not an actual full holoseries. So I believe the existence of such a program is original to this Hexnote here!
Arhul made sure that the details on how he had acquired the artifact were obscured, as he mentions not wanting to start any wars amongst the Gree clans, due to the convoluted and complex changing of hands it has already gone through. After presenting The Guild with the Khoz’zhak in the city of Satkian on Asation, Arhul boarded another vessel to the already mentioned Gree planet of Te Hasa. On Te Hasa he was granted permission by the Gree to visit the Great Library of Manuals. At the Great Library of Manuals, the Gree kept thousands of records, devices, and artifacts from their ancient history. The Great Library of Manuals comes out of The Gree Enclave yet Adventure Journal article yet again.
Arhul reflects that he could have spent years there, which is a nice detail to suggest just how expansive and detailed this library is. He meets in there with the Textmaster, which is a title given to the Gree leader of the Great Library of Manuals. The Textmaster comes from the Gree Enclave in addition to the sourcebook Alien Encounters. The Textmaster gives Arhul a personal tour of the Halls of the Most Ancient and Forgotten Days. Arhul spent weeks researching in here; determining that the ancient Gree had hidden their vast prehistorical knowledge of the galaxy within incredibly dense and hard to crack codexes and cyphers within their miraculous devices. This Hall of ancient knowledge is a new concept that originated in Supernatural Encounters.
During his time there, Arhul is able to uncover evidence for an ancient conflict between the Kwa and the Gree, an ancient war that Arhul seemingly finds was a conflict fought over The Infinity Gates being copied by the Gree into the Hypergates. This conflict that Arhul unearths is a preexisting Expanded Universe concept. The first EU mention of such a conflict between these two ancient species over the Infinity Gates comes from Jason Fry and Daniel Wallace’s The Essential Atlas.
Arhul mentions that other historians had seen this prior to him, but they had their biases; which caused them to miss the nuance to the conflict. Arhul believed there was a lot more to the ancient war than may have originally appeared.
Arhul asked the Gree Keepers of Artifacts, which I believe could be a new name to describe the Textmaster, but this is reading between the lines and not supported conclusively by evidence in the text; If there were other ancient species known to have been associated with the prehistoric Gree people.
Apparently some of the strange species depicted on the Khoz’Zhak artifact and on the art in the halls; did indeed depict ancient species long forgotten, that the Gree were also in contact with. We also learn for the first time what the artifact’s name means here, as Arhul learns that the word Khoz’Zhak means belligerent wanderers. It is then revealed to Arhul that the Khoz’Zhak antique is one of several different ancient Gree tablets known as the Accursed Tablet. This is an original idea to here. The accursed tablets are said to reveal the crimes committed by ancient exiled aliens.
What Arhul has discovered here, is that despite what conventional modern history suggested about the primal age, that connections did exist. From determining the similarities between species ancient writing and language, to realizing ancient conflicts were fought across the stars between alien people; Arhul is shown to be drawing connections that reveal the picture of the ancient prehistoric galaxy. And what he’s found has already contradicted the modern historical view of that era, as most historians would say contact between such species was unlikely, isolated, or just flat out something that couldn’t concur in the pre-hyperspace age. But Arhul’s quest for knowledge on the ancient past, has already dug up some fascinating information.
This is the start of what will spiral into a thrustful journey for knowledge. And I would point to his findings while he was amongst the Gree depicted here, as the first big kickstarter that encouraged him to keep digging.
While amongst the Gree, with the benefit of the great teachings he had received from Corellia, Arhul is able to open up the Khoz’Zhak to the astonished Gree. The item opens up to a holographic display of several alien beings. Unfortunately the language embedded there can not be determined by either Arhul or the Gree scholars. Arhul asks the Gree assembled there with him who the ancient species depicted were.
The knowledgeable Gree historians rattle off a list that includes the Kwa, Siniteen, Sharu, Arbrans, Eruthros, and Duinuogwuin peoples. Several of the species in this list have already appeared in previous chapters, but I’ll refresh your memory on the origin of these races. The Kwa first appeared in Star Wars 1998 #24, in the Infinity’s End arch before going on to appear prominently in the Dawn of the Jedi comics. The Siniteen species originated in A New Hope, where a member first appeared in the Mos Eisley Cantina.
The ancient Sharu originated in the Lando Calrissian Trilogy, though they were first visually depicted in West End Games material. The green Arbran people come straight from the original Marvel comics, in issue number 67. The Eruthros is a brand new name, that originates as a concept in Supernatural Encounters. Way later on, we will find out that they are the ancestors of a prominent and well known Expanded Universe species. And finally the amazing Duinogwuin people also called Star Dragons were first mentioned in Pizzazz issue number 3’s portion of the comic storyline The Keeper’s World. Star Dragons would later appear throughout the Expanded Universe, including within many West End Games articles, mentions in Galaxy of Fear and Jedi Prince young readers series, references in the Thrown trilogy, and New Jedi Order, and within Wizards of the Coast RPG source material.
The Gree elders bestow more knowledge to Arhul when they explain that despite not having the material with which to translate the symbols and writings of these species; they have been instructed rather diligently by their elders through the millennia to not share a meal or interact with these species. While they mention those restrictions have eased somewhat in the modern era, the inference from this revelation is that ancient grudges were held that caused the Gree to be wary of these other species, implying a lot of interaction between the ancient species.
Arhul is taken somewhat aback by this revelation, as his peers and fellow historians had labeled these various species depicted on ancient Gree artifacts as mythological gods that the primitive Gree worshipped, and not other sentient species that they had interacted with. As that would be at Odds with and outright contradict their supposition of separate evolution of the ancient alien species with no interaction with each other in those ancient stars.
Arhul is stunned by the revelation from the Gree he chatted with, and asks them why they didn’t correct the researchers whose conclusions were clearly in error.
The Gree say their opinion wasn’t asked for, and if it was, that the original researchers had already made their minds up anyway. So correcting them would have been fruitless.
Arhul asks if the Gree can help him locate the Star Dragon people, so he can speak with them. But the Gree tell him that they are unaware of where he could go to find them. They also warn him that the Siniteen look down their noses at any efforts to dig into their history, so he will not be welcomed to them.
Arhul asks who the Eruthros are, and the Gree reveal that they are unaware, and that that people’s identity remains a mystery.
Arhul mentions how the Kwa and Arbrans have long since vanished, so he won’t be able to contact them, which leaves him determined to seek out and contact the Sharu people in his endeavors to seek out the truth.
The Gree wish Arhul a very polite good luck, and ask that whatever he finds will be brought back in writing to their library for their study. Arhul says that once his notes are transcribed and edited he will bring them back personally. The Gree are pleased by Arhul’s answer and offer him a surprising courtesy that almost no non-free have been given previously, by telling him he is welcome back to the planet of Te Hasa any time. They wish him luck in his quest and Arhul departs from the planet, traveling back to Asation.
Arhul plots a course from there to the Rafa system, on his way there he recalls and reflects on the adventures of Lando Calrissian in the system that he is aware of. The Rafa System and Lando’s exploits recollected by Arhul, including the Mindharp and the Obroan Institute’s unfortunate interference in the system after Lando had left from reawakening the departed Sharu people all come from the L. Neil Smith’s Lando Calrissian Trilogy in addition to the sourcebook The Essential Chronology.
Arhul notes that the awakened Staru experienced a perhaps phony confused state of amnesia in an effort to finally convince the Obroan researchers to leave their planet and artifacts alone.
Arhul mentions then that he is grateful for the aid of his trusty droid companion Q9 who is with him on this journey. Q9 works on gathering information on the Sharu in the time since they have returned after Lando awakened them. Apparently they were terrible record keepers, as the information they had seemed wildly exaggerated or perhaps at Odds with each other. Arhul suspects that perhaps this seeming mess of contradictions was perhaps engineered on purpose by them to hide their secrets.
Arhul meets with members of the Sharu priesthood. And they tell Arhul that the Sharu people have long somewhat fearfully guarded their past history in the galaxy.
The Sharu priesthood tell Arhul that he should visit the planet Kar’a’Katok. Kar’a’Katok first appeared in Aliens in the Empire part 1, which was an article published to Hyperspace by Abel G Pena and Rich Handley. The planet would go onto be featured in The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia and The Essential Atlas.
Arhul visits the planet is disturbed by how eery the place is. He observes pyramids and ziggurats as well as a sigil that seems embowed and steeped in darkness; as it will go onto haunt Arhul for some time. The sigil is linked to a long departed King of Kar’a’Katok known as Astor. Several unconnected Astors appeared in the EU, including a Rebel named Astor from the Rebellion comics, and an Imperial aide named Jungle Astor from the video game Galaxies: An Empire Divided.
The planet just gives me the creeps in the way which Arhul talks about it. Arhul mentions the species that are native to Kar’a’Katok, the reptilian Shimholt who first came from The original Marvel comics in issue number 69. The ancient Shimholt Arhul describes as reclusive and xenophobic, though during the Subterra Period they came out of their shells. The Subterranean Period is a name for a period of galactic history that dated from approximately 8000 to 7000 BBY. The Subterranean Period was mentioned for the first time in 2004’s sourcebook Geonosis and the Outer Rim Worlds.
The Shimholt’s expansions into friendly relationships with neighboring planets apparently last for a few millennia, before they encountered the Nelori Marauders. The Memoir Marauders were first mentioned in the Tales of the Jedi companion. And were included in a short story about Arca Jeth and his participation in a conflict called the Hyabb-Twith Campaigns. In the short story, which I reviewed on my channel, the Nelori Marauders are introduced as the antagonists who fought against the Jedi Order, including a young Jedi Knight Arca Seth during these campaigns. Since we know the Nelori Marauders were active around 4,000 BBY, we can parse that the Shimholt species expansionist era could have lasted for as long as 4,000 years.
The Shimholt conflict with the Nelori Marauders was mentioned in the aforementioned Hyperspace article Aliens in the Empire. As a result of the conflict between the organization and the Shimholt species, the Shimholt were forced again to seclude themselves from the rest of the galaxy, after the Nelori Marauders stole many of their priceless artifacts. The explosive conflict Arhul references as having taken place during the Post Mandarin period, a period of time that takes place from 5,000 to 4,000 BBY. This period has been given to the out of universe Tales of the Jedi comics and surrounding stories, as the era in which they take place by some source material. But never explicitly in the text before now was this name ascribed to this time period.
Arhul finds proof in ancient artifacts during his time on Shimholt that the Shimholt people were planning to leave their homeward along with another ancient alien species that was part of the Elder Races. This was a very promising trail of bread crumbs, that could be the firsts step for Arhul in finding the key to everything. Also mentioned in the Shimholt High Priest’s artifacts was an ancient conflict called the Twilight Wars. Which we will find out a lot more about much later on in Supernatural Encounters. The Twilight Wars are a fascinating important concept that I can’t wait to talk about more.
But it is here at the end of page 41, that the chapter ends; with Arhul having a clue on what planet to visit next, due to their connection with the Shimholt. Arhul is following a hot trail, and I can’t wait to talk about it more, next time, when I breakdown Chapter 5: Secrets of the Keeper. I hope you enjoyed my breakdown of Chapter 4, and I’ll see you guys next time!
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