Pain.
Not sharp. Not sudden.A deep, throbbing ache pulsing from beneath my ribs — like something inside me was trying to remember how to exist.
Breathing burned.Blinking scraped.But I was alive.
When my eyes finally opened, a low thatched ceiling greeted me. Thin bands of sunlight slipped through cracks in the roof, falling in trembling lines across mud walls tinted with neem paste. The air smelled of herbs — pungent, sharp, grounding.
A silhouette sat beside me.
Tall. Cloaked in white. Arms folded. Eyes sharp as a hawk's.
"…Guru…deva?" I croaked, the word scraping out of a dry throat.
The figure turned.
Not a Deva.
Guru Vasistha.
My father's closest friend. The man who had dragged Varun and Lakshmika away from the battlefield. A master swordsman known across Aryavart.
He raised an eyebrow. "Finally awake," he said dryly. "I was beginning to consider dragging your soul back from Yama myself."
Despite the faint mockery, his eyes betrayed relief.
I tried to sit up — a mistake.White-hot pain exploded through my abdomen.
Guru Vasistha pressed a palm to my shoulder, firm but gentle. "Don't move. Your wound may be closed, but your body remembers what the Asura did to it."
My voice trembled. "Then… how am I still here?"
He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he uncorked a small clay vial and tilted a few drops of golden liquid into my mouth. It was bitter — so bitter tears pricked my eyes.
"That," he said, recorking it, "is what kept you alive."
"What… is it?"
He exhaled slowly. "The Asura's life-essence. Purified."
My blood ran cold.
I had seen Asuras only once. I didn't know they had essence. And certainly not that it could be… consumed.
Guru continued quietly:
"Asura prana is corrupted — twisted by hatred, hunger, and stolen life. No human should touch it. It can… change you."He paused."I extracted what little I could and cleansed it. Not fully — no one can cleanse darkness completely — but enough to keep your chakras from collapsing."
"Chakras…" I repeated, the word feeling foreign.
Guru's gaze softened with patient wisdom. "Think of them as seven gates within you. Seven cores of prana. They shape who you are — strength, breath, will, truth. If they shut down, you do too."
A chill crept up my spine. "They were… shutting down?"
"Nearly sealed," he said. "A moment more and you would've drifted across the veil permanently."
I stared at the ceiling, pulse racing.If he was telling the truth — and Guru Vasistha always told the truth — then stepping back into the world of the living was a miracle.
No…Not a miracle.
A presence.
My chest tightened."Guru…"
"Yes?"
"I saw… someone."
He turned to me fully.
"I don't remember his face clearly," I said slowly, the memory returning in fragments. "Blue light. Calm eyes. He held Vajra. He spoke to me. Told me I wasn't ready. Told me to train."
Guru Vasistha's brows lowered — not in fear, but contemplation.
"A Deva," he murmured. "Or a spirit of high order. Someone beyond mortal understanding."
"You believe me?"
"With matters of fate," he said, "I'd be a fool not to."
His tone was calm, but something flickered behind his eyes — unease, curiosity, maybe even reverence.
He knew something had happened.But he didn't know who had come.Or why.
And that frightened him more than he let on.
He stood then, brushing off his robes. "You were unconscious for a full day. We're at my hermitage — a short walk from the Gurukul grounds. The princes are safe. Tomorrow is the opening ceremony."
Relief washed over me — then faded, replaced by a quiet heaviness.
"Guru…" I whispered. "Why did you leave me behind that day? Why did you save them but not me?"
He froze.
A long silence stretched between us.
Finally, he spoke — not as a warrior, not as a Guru, but as a man weighed by knowledge he wished he didn't have.
"Because destiny stood at your shoulder, Aryaman."
I looked up sharply.
He continued:
"I sensed a thread around you — something ancient, something I had no right to interfere with. You were meant to face that Asura alone. If I had stepped in, the flow of your fate would've… warped."
He looked away, as if the memory unsettled him.
"I believed you wouldn't die that day," he said softly. "Not with that thread burning so brightly."
I swallowed hard.
He was hiding more.I could feel it in the air between us.But I wasn't ready to ask.
Not yet.
He walked toward the door.
"What lies ahead?" I asked quietly.
His hand paused on the frame.
"Pain. Tests. Choices."A faint smile. "Greatness, if you endure. You were not born for an ordinary path, Aryaman."
He slipped outside, the fading sunlight outlining his silhouette before it disappeared entirely.
The door creaked shut.
Silence returned.
I laid back slowly, fingers brushing against Vajra resting beside me.The blade was cold yet steady — like the hand of a companion, like a promise made in steel.
Something deep inside me pulsed — faint, steady, alive.
Not an awakening.Not power.
Just a heartbeat refusing to stop.
My chakras had survived.My will had endured.
And my story… was far from over.