Pain was the first thing Ajay learned in life.
It greeted him every morning—sometimes as a slap, sometimes as a kick, sometimes as a stone thrown by boys who enjoyed watching him curl into a ball.
In the village, cruelty wasn't a crime. It was entertainment.
Ajay sometimes wondered if death would be less painful than living.
He didn't know why he was everyone's favorite target. Maybe it was his lighter skin, which made him look different. Maybe it was his pretty face—pretty for a poor village boy, at least—when not covered in bruises. Or maybe the world simply hated him.
At ten years old, Ajay had never known a day without fear.
He worked at the Dump, a sprawling mountain of smoking refuse outside the village. Every step sank into decomposing layers of rot and acid. As a rag picker, Ajay endured more shoves and slaps than actual work.
The overseer, Raman, controlled the food. A complaint meant no dinner. A mistake meant a beating.
Sometimes no mistake was needed at all.
His parents never defended him. They treated him like a burden that refused to die. Ajay had stopped crying long ago. His heart had learned to shrink itself into silence.
But that evening felt… wrong.
He received his meal without being shoved aside. No one knocked his food into the dirt. No one laughed as he ate. Even Raman appeared strangely controlled, almost tense.
Too tense.
As Ajay finished his meal, Kalam approached him. Kalam was the closest thing he had to a friend—skinny, soft-hearted, always playing with the frayed string tied around his wrist when he was nervous.
"Raman called you," Kalam whispered. "Be careful. His face looks… different today."
Ajay tried to smile. "It's always something bad. Let's get it over with."
He took two steps before older boys blocked his path.
"Going to the king's tent?" Greff sneered.
"Good luck, punch bag," the other added. "Raman's got something special for you tonight."
Their laughter echoed behind him as he walked.
Ajay reached Raman's "office"—a tent patched with stitched-together tarps, surrounded by sorted trash heaps. Inside, a weak lantern flickered unevenly.
Raman was sitting, but the moment Ajay entered, he stood up.
Ajay froze.
Raman never stood for anyone.
Something was definitely wrong.
"Come here," Raman said. His voice was unnaturally calm. "I have a task for you."
He reached under a cracked table and lifted a small cloth-wrapped package. It looked light, but Raman held it with cautious, almost fearful hands.
"Take this to the shrine in the forest."
Ajay's stomach twisted.
The shrine.
Even adults avoided that place at night. Children whispered stories—of glowing eyes between trees, of silent hunters, of villagers who walked in and never walked out.
"R-right now?" Ajay asked. "Can't I go in the morning?"
"No." Raman's eyes sharpened. "It must reach before dawn."
"But… the beasts—"
"It won't be dangerous if you follow my instructions."
Raman opened a small clay pot filled with a thick, metallic-smelling oil. "This will hide your scent."
Ajay didn't like the way Raman said that. As if he knew exactly what hunted those woods.
"What's inside the package?" Ajay asked.
For the first time that night, Raman smiled—thin, unnatural.
"You don't need to know."
Then colder: "And you must not open it. If you do… you won't live long enough to regret it."
Ajay swallowed.
"If you deliver it before morning," Raman added, "you will receive meals twice a day. Every day."
Ajay's breath hitched.
Two meals.
For a starving child, that wasn't a reward—it was salvation.
"…I'll go," he whispered.
"Good." Raman dipped his fingers into the oil and rubbed it across Ajay's arms, neck, and chest. The smell clung to his skin—sharp, metallic, wrong.
"Follow the path I tell you. Do not stray. Do not stop. Do not look back."
Ajay nodded.
As he stepped out of the tent, clutching the package to his chest, Kalam rushed to him.
"What did he ask you to do?" Kalam whispered, fingers twisting the string around his wrist.
"A delivery," Ajay said. "I'll be back soon."
But the forest loomed far in the distance—an enormous, silent shadow swallowing the night.
And for the first time in his life, Ajay felt something shifting inside him.
Tonight, the world was going to change.
Either for the better—
—or forever.