I shall not be denied immortality.
—Darth Drear
Darth Drear was a male Zabrak Sith Lord, and prominent Sith alchemist, who lived thousands of years before the Battle of Endor during the reign of the Sith Empire. Like most Sith, he was obsessed with the idea of immortality and sought a path to eternal life through Sith alchemy. He eventually ruled over his homeworld of Crucible and was also responsible for founding the Sith Academy on Odacer-Faustin.
Biography[]
Darth Drear was born thousands of years before the Battle of Endor[2] on the planet Crucible.[1] At some point, he became the Sith ruler of the world under the Sith Empire and had a Sith temple, dubbed the Temple of the Sith, built in the Barrens in his honor. From this temple, he conducted a dangerous dark side ritual that tore the life from the surrounding planet and animal life, creating the Barrens' modern appearance and a nexus of dark side energy.
Later in his life, he traveled to the ice-covered world of Odacer-Faustin and established a Sith academy. There, he used the students to construct both the academy and his secret, underground temple in order to house his "experiments". His research would eventually lead to a forerunner to Project Blackwing—a virus that turned its infected victims into ravenous zombies—with the intention of using the virus to obtain immortality.
He was ultimately unsuccessful and succumb to the disease.[2] Sometime before his death, he had a tomb constructed for him on his homeworld of Crucible, in the vicinity of his original temple.[1]
Legacy[]
Drear left behind a holocron that contained his knowledge of Sith alchemy and the deadly virus he had conceptualized. His knowledge would lead to three outbreaks of the Blackwing virus:[1] the most catastrophic being The Turn on his homeworld of Crucible.
His lineage would become the royal family of his homeworld and a cult of Sith fanatics, dubbed the Disciples of Drear, would arise thousands of years later and take residence in his abandoned temple.
Behind the scenes[]
Drear was always an interesting character to me. He wasn't mentioned much in Red Harvest, other than serving as a source of backstory for the story, and thus providing an origin for the virus that appeared in the more famous Death Troopers novel. In [Legacy of Evil], I wanted to go back to his story and his origins to flesh out another chapter in the story of Project Blackwing and its mysterious Sith inventor.
—Ten Tailed Fox about Darth Drear
Darth Drear was first mentioned in author Joe Schreiber's 2010 novel, Red Harvest. He laid the foundations for "the Sickness", the virus that would come to be known as Project Blackwing. His existence and contributions to Blackwing were later regulated to non-canon when the Expanded Universe became Star Wars Legends. The fan fiction novel Legacy of Evil reintroduced Drear as the virus's origin and elaborated more on his character, including his species and background.
Appearances[]
- De Infinitas Mysteriis (First appearance)
- Star Wars: Red Harvest (Mentioned only)
- Star Wars: Legacy of Evil (Mentioned only)