With Devi Jyoti, Rudra's training took a different direction.
Ganesha had begun with his spirit and the deeper energies within him, teaching Rudra how to enter himself and understand the ancient power that lay hidden throughout his being. Karthikeya had taken him to the opposite end of that understanding, teaching him that immense strength was meaningless without control over one's own body.
But Devi Jyoti...
She began with fire.
And not merely the fire that burned outside.
She began with the fire that lived within every living being.
For fire was more than flame.
It was warmth, passion, anger, courage, desire, ambition, destruction and creation. It could illuminate the darkness, but it could also consume everything around it. It could bring life through warmth and energy, yet when left uncontrolled, the same fire could turn into devastation.
And so, before Rudra could truly learn how to control fire...
He first had to understand emotions.
Devi Jyoti's chosen place for his training was unlike the open grounds of Kailash where Karthikeya had trained him. It was a vast enclosed space, ancient and immense, with a circular platform at its centre. Around the walls, divine flames burned within large braziers, and the heat within the place was far greater than anything Rudra had experienced before.
But it was not the flames surrounding the chamber that first captured his attention.
It was the centre.
At the very heart of the place, a vortex of fire rotated slowly above the ground.
Its flames moved in circles, twisting and rising before falling back into themselves, as if the fire itself was breathing. Different colours appeared within the vortex, from deep crimson and bright orange to golden and almost white flames at its core.
Rudra found himself staring at it.
There was something within him that responded to it.
He could feel an attraction.
Not simply curiosity.
The flames were calling towards him.
Or perhaps...
He was being drawn towards them.
Rudra felt the centre of the vortex pulling gently at something within him, and for a brief moment, his eyes remained fixed upon it as though his entire body had forgotten the world around him.
Devi Jyoti noticed.
She did not say anything.
Not yet.
But she took note of it.
She simply watched Rudra for a moment before continuing his lesson, her expression remaining calm and unreadable.
The first part of Rudra's training began with understanding the relationship between emotions and flame. Devi Jyoti explained that a person could not completely separate their powers from their emotions, especially when the power itself was connected with an element as expressive and unstable as fire. Anger could make the flames more destructive, fear could make them unstable, desire could make them wild and uncontrolled, while courage, determination and focus could strengthen and shape them.
Rudra had to learn that controlling his emotions did not mean destroying them.
He had to understand them.
He had to know what he was feeling, why he was feeling it and when that emotion needed to be allowed to exist. There would be moments when anger would be necessary, moments when compassion would be needed and moments when fear itself could save his life. The problem was never the existence of an emotion.
The problem was losing control of oneself because of it.
And so Devi Jyoti taught Rudra how to enter different emotional states without allowing those emotions to completely control him. She guided him through exercises in which he would bring memories to the surface, allowing himself to feel anger, sadness, fear, happiness, determination and even longing, while simultaneously maintaining his awareness of himself.
At first, his flames responded immediately.
When anger rose within him, the fire around his hands burned more fiercely.
When sadness entered his heart, the flames weakened and lowered.
When his mind became uncertain, the fire flickered.
And when Rudra focused himself, the flames slowly became calm and steady.
This continued for many days.
Rudra learned how to create a flame without allowing it to grow beyond his control, how to make it small and then expand it, how to maintain its temperature and how to change its shape. At first, his control was crude and unstable, but gradually, he developed a rudimentary understanding of the element.
He could summon fire.
He could extinguish it.
He could shape it to some extent.
He could change its intensity.
And most importantly...
He had begun learning how not to allow his emotions to control it.
It was during one such training session that Devi Jyoti finally approached him after observing him maintain a flame within his palm.
"Would you like to learn how to forge?"
Rudra looked towards her.
Devi Jyoti's gaze shifted towards the fire vortex at the centre of the chamber.
"Not simply to create a weapon... but to create one that belongs to you. A weapon shaped according to your own body, your own strength and your own nature."
Rudra remained silent.
"A weapon that will not simply be given to you, but one that you will understand from its first breath of metal until its final form."
There was something about those words that immediately caught Rudra's interest.
A weapon of his own.
Not something chosen for him.
Not something handed to him.
But something he would understand...
And perhaps...
One day forge with his own hands.
And so, Rudra's journey into forging began.
Before Devi Jyoti allowed him anywhere near the creation of a weapon, however, she began with the basics.
Fire.
Heat.
Metal.
And patience.
She explained that a weapon was not simply a piece of metal that had been sharpened and given a handle. Every metal carried different properties, and every element that was added or removed during the process changed the final result. Some metals were harder but brittle, others flexible but weaker, while some possessed the ability to carry and retain divine energy better than others.
Rudra learned about iron and its nature, about the impurities found within raw ores and the processes through which those impurities could be removed. He learned about different metals, alloys and minerals, along with certain divine materials whose properties differed from anything
found in the ordinary mortal world.
Some materials could hold greater amounts of energy.
Some could conduct it.
Some could resist extreme heat.
Others could absorb the nature of a particular element.
Devi Jyoti explained that a weapon made for Rudra could not simply be created from a strong material. It had to be made from something compatible with him, something capable of surviving his strength and responding to the immense energies that would eventually flow through it.
And so...
They began with iron.
Rudra was first taught how raw iron ore was processed. Before it could ever become a weapon, the metal hidden within the stone had to be separated from everything that did not belong to it. The ore had to be broken, heated and processed until the impurities were gradually removed.
Devi Jyoti first demonstrated the process to him, explaining how heat changed the structure of the material and how different levels of temperature could separate useful metal from unwanted impurities. Rudra listened carefully, but listening was only the beginning.
Soon...
He had to do it himself.
Rudra stood before the divine forge with his upper body bare, wearing his Shvet Chandra Vastra Dhoti, his hair tied back enough to keep it away from the fire. The heat around the forge was immense, far greater than the natural flames he had previously worked with.
Rudra had already developed some control over the Fire element.
But that did not make him immune to every form of heat.
Especially not this.
The divine flames of the forge burned with an intensity that demanded respect, and even though Rudra could guide and manipulate ordinary fire to some extent, his control over the Fire element was still far from sufficient to completely ignore the power of the forge.
And so...
For perhaps the first time since his transformation, Rudra truly sweated.
The heat caused his upper back to glisten as sweat slowly travelled down the muscles of his shoulders and spine. His arms tightened around the heavy hammer as he continued working upon the iron before him, while the fire illuminated his bare body with its golden and crimson light.
He brought the hammer down.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Each strike carried immense strength, but strength alone was not enough. Karthikeya had already taught him that.
So Rudra had to control himself.
Too much force could deform the metal.
Too little would achieve nothing.
The strike had to come at the correct moment, with the correct amount of strength and at the correct position.
And so, even while forging, Rudra found himself using the lessons of Karthikeya.
Control.
Balance.
Rhythm.
Rudra slowly began understanding that the lessons given to him by the different gods and goddesses of Kailash were not separate from one another. Ganesha had taught him to control his mind, Karthikeya was teaching him to control his body, and now Devi Jyoti was teaching him to understand how his emotions and inner energy could become fire.
Everything was connected.
The fire responded to his emotions.
His body controlled the movement of the hammer.
His mind controlled his body.
And his spirit stood behind all of them.
As Rudra continued hammering and working with the iron, Devi Jyoti continued explaining the deeper principles behind the craft. Forging was not merely about heating metal until it became soft and striking it repeatedly. Every part of a weapon had a purpose.
The thickness of the blade affected its balance.
The balance affected how quickly it could move.
The shape determined how force travelled through it.
The internal composition of the metal affected its strength.
The placement of the handle determined how the weapon responded to the body of the one using it.
Even the smallest changes could affect the final weapon.
A poorly balanced weapon could become a burden rather than an extension of the body. A weapon that was too rigid could break, while one that was too soft could bend. A weapon could be powerful, but if it was not made according to the nature of the person using it, much of that power could be wasted.
Rudra listened carefully.
His journey had only begun, and Devi Jyoti had no intention of allowing him to simply forge a weapon because he desired one. Before he could create something capable of becoming an extension of himself, Rudra would first have to understand the nature of the materials he would work with.
He would have to learn how metal responded to heat.
How impurities weakened it.
How different materials could be combined.
How the hammer could shape it.
How fire could change it.
And how a weapon was given more than a form...
It was given purpose.
For now, Rudra had only begun learning how to work with iron, how to smelt it, purify it and refine it into a usable form. He was nowhere near ready to forge his own weapon.
Not yet.
But as Rudra stood before the divine forge, surrounded by fire and heat, his hands holding the hammer as sweat glistened across his body and the flames reflected within his eyes, the beginning of something important had already taken place.
A weapon had not yet been forged.
But Rudra had stepped into the fire.
And one day...
He would emerge with something of his own.
For he still has to learn about metals and materials that are not for mortals, but for the likes of divines and for him, the being he has become and will become in the future.