"When the world thinks your story has ended… destiny writes a secret chapter only you were meant to read."
Arjun looked down.
A monstrous claw had pierced clean through his chest. Darkness crept into his eyes, and cold began to numb his limbs.
He whispered softly, his voice barely audible over the storm of chaos around him,
"Nitisha... forgive me. I failed to save our world. Perhaps… this truly is the end of our Earth."
And with that final breath, his body gave in, falling helplessly through the thick abyss of shadows. His eyes began to close slowly, swallowed by the same darkness that now blanketed the world.
In his ears, one voice echoed — her voice — soft, sorrowful, and final:
"Goodbye, Arjun. If fate allows… we will meet again."
And with those words, Arjun disappeared into the void.
As his body drifted deeper into the darkness, his life began to play before his eyes — from the innocence of childhood to the bitter days of helplessness, when fate had left him broken and crippled.
Memories swirled like a silent film: smiles, screams, battles, losses… and then — a face. A familiar, radiant face, glowing against the pitch-black backdrop, wearing the sweetest smile. She looked at him with warmth and spoke in her soft, melodic voice.
"Arjun."
Tears welled in his eyes as he whispered, his throat thick with emotion,
"Nitisha... why did you leave me? Why did you go away?"
Nitisha smiled gently and replied,
"I never left you, Arjun. I've always been with you — and I always will be. But you… why are you here? You must go back. They need you."
Arjun shook his head, refusing with desperation.
"No! I won't leave you again!"
Nitisha's smile faded, replaced by a trace of frustration.
"Why are you so stubborn, Arjun? I told you to leave! I'm waiting… waiting for you to return — truly return! Now go!"
And with that, she placed her hands on his chest and pushed him backward.
The force of her touch sent him hurtling out of the void — a blast of light tearing through the darkness. His gaze remained fixed on her until the very end, watching as her face slowly vanished into the shadows once more.
"Nitisha!"
Arjun's scream pierced the silence as he jolted awake, his eyes snapping open. But instead of the battlefield, he found himself lying inside an old bamboo hut — fragile, crumbling, and falling apart at the seams. The walls were cracked, the roof barely held together, and the entire place exuded the scent of damp earth and decay.
Confused and disoriented, Arjun tried to rise, but the moment he moved, a searing pain ripped through his body — so intense, it felt like his very soul was being torn apart.
As he writhed in agony, a gruff, irritated voice reached his ears.
"Boy, stop moving so much! You'll tear your wounds open again. They're still fresh — one wrong move and they'll go deeper than before!"
The voice felt strangely familiar, but Arjun was too consumed by the pain and confusion to think deeply about it. Without glancing toward the source, he asked hoarsely,
"Did we… win? Did mankind defeat the demons? Are they… are they all gone?"
The old man stared at him, his expression laced with both concern and disbelief. After a moment, he stepped closer and spoke softly,
"Seems like those injuries have scrambled your mind too. What nonsense are you talking about? Enough with the delirium — lie still so I can treat you."
Without waiting for a response, the man dipped his fingers into a small clay bowl and began applying a green medicinal paste to Arjun's arm. The moment it touched his skin, Arjun cried out again — the pain was excruciating.
But then, something strange caught his attention. He looked down at his arm in shock — not because of the bandages or the herbal paste smeared over it… but because the arm was there at all.
"My hand…" he whispered, eyes wide with disbelief. "How… how is my hand intact? It was… it was cut off during the war!"
The old man frowned, clearly annoyed.
"I told you to stop moving, didn't I? And now you're spouting more nonsense! Demons? War? What are you talking about? You injured yourself during training, remember? You almost reached 'Zero', but you made a critical mistake. That's how you got hurt — and why your power source was destroyed!"
Arjun froze, eyes locked on the man.
"No… that can't be right. That all happened… twenty years ago…"
Before he could finish the sentence, he looked closely at the old man's face — and gasped.
It was him. The same healer. The very man who had once tried to save Arjun after he'd been gravely wounded in battle. Back then, Arjun had lost everything — his strength, his purpose, his future. Though the man had managed to heal his outer wounds, the internal damage had been beyond his skill. Arjun had lived the rest of his life as a powerless cripple… a fallen warrior.
But now, here he was — younger, standing before the same healer. The timeline made no sense.
Back then, it had been twenty years. But now…
The old man narrowed his eyes at Arjun's stunned expression.
"You've been unconscious for twenty days, boy! Not twenty years! Seems like the loss of your powers has messed with your head too. Stop talking such nonsense."
Upon hearing the old man's words, Arjun was once again stunned. He stared at the elder in disbelief and said,
"Baba, I think there's some confusion. My powers were destroyed twenty years ago—when I was just thirteen! I'm thirty-three now. It's been two decades since that day."
He looked at the old man, who continued to gaze at him with an expression that grew increasingly strange. The look in the elder's eyes was so peculiar, Arjun couldn't help but question it.
"Why are you looking at me like that, Baba? As if I'm raving like a madman?"
The old man chuckled dryly and replied,
"You're not wrong, boy. You are talking like a lunatic. Did you just say you're thirty-three years old? Boy, take a look in the mirror. See for yourself whether you look thirty-three… or thirteen!"
With that, the old man held up a mirror in front of him.
The moment Arjun looked into it, he felt a jolt run through his entire body — like lightning striking his very soul.
Because the face staring back at him wasn't that of a grown man. It was the youthful, innocent face of a thirteen-year-old boy — the very face he had seen two decades ago.
"This… this is my face? How can it look so young?" Arjun muttered, shocked.
His eyes quickly scanned his entire body, and what he saw confirmed the impossible — not just his face, but his entire body had reverted to its thirteen-year-old form. Confusion gripped him. What was happening to him?
Looking around, Arjun suddenly recognized his surroundings. He was standing in the very same place where, twenty years ago, he had collapsed — where the path to his powers had been destroyed.
The old man's words echoed in his ears: "You've been unconscious for twenty days."
Everything was playing out exactly as it had before. Twenty years ago, after losing his powers, he had been wounded so badly he remained unconscious for days. It had been a miracle he survived at all, as surviving the collapse of one's power path was nearly impossible. Only a handful had ever lived through it, and even those who did were left crippled, stripped of all strength.
It took Arjun a long moment to grasp the truth — he had been reborn. Sent back in time twenty years.
At first, a surge of hope lit up his face. He had been given a second chance — a chance to stop the monsters, to save Mirage. But that hope quickly faded as he remembered… his power path was still destroyed.
"What's the point of this rebirth," he whispered bitterly, "if I'm doomed to live again like a cripple, powerless? I would've been better off dying with Nitisha!"
As the weight of it crashed down on him, Arjun broke down, tears streaming down his face.
The old man stepped forward and gently placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Don't fall apart like this, boy. The gods may have taken your power path, but they haven't taken away your will. You still have another path — the path of the warrior. With a single weapon, you can rise again… and become great."
But Arjun remained silent, his sorrow undiminished.
Because in his past life, he had already chosen that path.
After the destruction of his power, he had trained relentlessly in swordsmanship, devoting his entire life to mastering the blade. But in the end… it hadn't mattered. He had still died by the hands of those monsters. He couldn't even protect the one he loved — his Nitisha.
As soon as the memory of Nitisha surfaced, tears welled up in Arjun's eyes once more. Sobbing uncontrollably, he whispered to himself,
"Nitisha... I know. If I've been granted this second life, it's only because of you. You gave up your own life to breathe new air into mine."
His voice cracked as he continued, "But what good is this life if I have no power? If once again, demons and monsters descend upon Earth, and like before... I remain helpless? Then what's the point of living at all?"
Tears streamed down his face again. But just then, something stirred within him — a strange energy, faint yet unmistakable, surged through his body. Alarmed and curious, Arjun looked inward, focusing on his core. There, where his power source should have been, shimmered a glowing sphere of light — unfamiliar, yet deeply familiar. It radiated with the same essence as the luminous ring Nitisha had created by sacrificing herself in his previous life.
He stared at it, stunned. And then, the orb exploded with brilliant radiance, the blinding light surging into every corner of his being. As the energy coursed through him, sharp pain erupted in his body — unbearable, searing agony. Every place the light touched felt as if it was being torn apart from within.
"Ahhhhhh!" Arjun screamed, the pain unbearable.
The old man, who had been nearby, jolted upright and rushed to his side. Concern darkened his face as he asked, "Boy, what's happening? Why are you screaming like that?"
But before he could even finish, his eyes caught sight of a blinding ancient glow radiating from Arjun's body. Within seconds, the light became so intense that the old man could no longer keep his eyes open. He instinctively shielded his face and staggered back a few steps, murmuring in disbelief,
"This… this ancient power. How is such a force emerging from this boy?"
He tried opening his eyes again, but the intensity of the light forced them shut. An overwhelming pressure weighed down on him — a pressure unlike anything he had felt in decades, ancient and divine in origin. Breathless, he stepped even farther back, barely able to withstand the force.
Meanwhile, Arjun writhed on the bed in sheer agony. The pain was beyond anything he had endured before — not even the destruction of his Power Path had brought such torment. It felt as though every bone in his body was being melted, as if plunged into boiling acid. The pain mounted, unbearable and merciless, until finally — his body gave in.
He collapsed onto the bed, unconscious, his breathing shallow and faint — but within him, something had awakened.