Takara Mountains

"It's cooler in the mountain shadows."

- Ahri Raas

The Takara Mountains, known originally by the native Keshiri species as the Cetajan Mountains, were a mountain range on the remote Wild Space planet of Kesh. In 5,000 BBY, during the Great Hyperspace War, a Sith starship, the Omen, crash-landed in these mountains. The survivors of the crash were stranded on the planet and eventually formed the Lost Tribe of Sith. They built a Sith Temple in the mountains, over and around the crash site of the Omen.

Grand Lord Nida Korsin ordered the Sith Tribe to abandon the Temple in the mountains, an order that remained in effect for over a thousand years. In 3,963 BBY, the Jedi Jelph Marrian crash-landed in the jungle highlands in the mountains; he lived among the Sith as a poor merchant who traded with the Keshiri, although Sith Saber Orielle Kitai eventually discovered the truth of his past. By 41 ABY, millennia after Korsin's order, the Sith had returned to the Temple and the mountains.

Description
"That's&mdash;that's a granite peak. It's not volcanic!''" "It is now!"

- Adari Vaal and Izri Dazh

The Takara Mountains were a non-volcanic mountain range located on the remote Wild Space planet of Kesh. Rocky, sharp, and ridged, they bordered one of the planet's oceans. Located within the mountains was a Sith Temple, built by a group of Sith that was stranded on the planet in 5,000 BBY. The mountains were very steep, and the Temple was accessible only by air or by a hazardous climb up the slopes.

The mountains were tall, rising high into the air, and some of them accumulated snow on their tips. The slopes were covered in loose rock, although there were also clearings of grass in the lower areas of the mountains. At the base of the mountains were grassy foothills, and many of the mountains themselves were covered in a dense jungle&mdash;in which even most of the Sith did not dare venture. Mixed amongst the mountains were also various active volcanoes.

History
"No, I've ordered that all Sith remove themselves from this mountain, in honor of Father's passing. While I live, none may return here."

- Nida Korsin

In 5,000 BBY, during the Great Hyperspace War, a Sith warship, the Omen, was attempting to deliver a shipment of Lignan crystals to Sith Lord Naga Sadow when the vessel was knocked off course while executing a hyperspace jump. It was forced to crash-land in the Takara Mountain range&mdash;then known as the Cetajan Range&mdash;on the remote planet of Kesh. The crash was witnessed by the Keshiri in the city of Tahv, and they believed it to be a volcanic eruption. The Keshiri took this as a sign that their gods, the Skyborn, were angry at them because of the heretic teachings of Adari Vaal. Vaal was forced to escape Tahv on the back of her uvak, Nink, and she took up refuge in the mountains, where she saw the wreckage of the Omen. The Omen captain, Yaru Korsin, dueled his brother, Devore Korsin, on the crash-site of the ship shortly after the incident, over which of them would lead the Sith survivors. Yaru killed Devore by dropping him over the edge of a precipice into the ocean below.

The survivors of the crash, who would eventually become the Lost Tribe of Sith, befriended the planet's native sentient species, the Keshiri, who believed them to be their gods, and used them to assist in the construction of a new Sith Temple over and around the ruins of the Omen in the mountains. By 4,985 BBY, the Cetajan Range had been renamed the Takara Mountains after Yaru Korsin's mother, Takara Korsin. Ten years later, another duel took place near the Omen crash site in the Takara Mountains, in which Korsin was killed. Korsin's daughter, Nida, then became the Tribe's Grand Lord.

In memory of her father, Nida Korsin ordered the Sith to abandon the Temple in the mountains, so the Sith moved to Tahv&mdash;this move remained in effect for generations after Korsin's death. As such, when the Jedi Jelph Marrian crashed in the jungle highlands in 3,963 BBY, his presence was not immediately detected. Marrian began to live on a farm, and although he was found by the Sith, he masqueraded as a slave who traded with the Keshiri. Over time, he managed to recover his starfighter piece-by-piece from the jungle highlands, bringing it down from the mountains and hiding it near his home. However, in 3,960 BBY, his past was discovered by the Sith Saber Orielle Kitai&mdash;who had recently fallen prey to a conspiracy that resulted in her being made a slave&mdash;and she quickly moved to reveal this information to the rest of the Sith as a way to ensure her reinstatement in the Tribe.

Eventually, the Sith returned to the temple in the mountains. In 41 ABY, a Sith Meditation Sphere known as Ship arrived on Kesh to make contact with the Tribe and help train their apprentices. It first spoke through the Force with Sith Tyro Vestara Khai in the Sith Temple's courtyard, in the midst of the mountain range.

Behind the scenes
The Takara Mountains first appeared as an unnamed mountain range in the eBook Lost Tribe of the Sith: Precipice, released on May 28, 2009. They were later named in Omen, author Christie Golden's first Star Wars novel and the second novel in the Fate of the Jedi series. It was released on June 23, 2009. The Mountains have subsequently appeared in each of the Lost Tribe of the Sith eBooks to date.

Appearances

 * Lost Tribe of the Sith: Precipice
 * Lost Tribe of the Sith: Skyborn
 * Lost Tribe of the Sith: Paragon
 * Lost Tribe of the Sith: Savior
 * Lost Tribe of the Sith: Purgatory
 * Lost Tribe of the Sith: Sentinel
 * Omen