Arjun and Gopi ran blindly through the jungle, branches lashing their arms. Their breaths came in ragged gasps, lungs burning as terror pushed them forward.
"You're an Avatar, Arjun," Gopi blurted out between breaths, disbelief and excitement colliding in his voice. "How does it even feel?"
Arjun shook his head while running. "I don't know what that thing was rambling about. But I've always felt… something about this mark. Like it didn't belong to me."
Gopi nodded frantically, his chest heaving as he struggled for air. "Every time I looked at that mark, Arjun, I felt... unsettled. Like it was a piece of a different world stitched onto yours. It felt like something that simply wasn't meant to exist in this light."
Arjun opened his mouth to reply, but the words died in his throat as they burst through the dense thicket into a wide, exposed clearing. It was a tactical disaster—the protective canopy that had been their shelter was gone, leaving them starkly visible against the scorched earth.
The air behind them vibrate and shattered. The thunderous, rhythmic thwack of massive wings echoed through the clearing, a sound like heavy sails snapping in a gale.
Arjun spun around just as the sky spat death. Blazing fireballs, roaring with a supernatural hunger, tore through the twilight. The projectiles slammed into the ground mere inches from their heels, the concussive force sending both boys hurtling forward. They hit the dirt hard, rolling helplessly.
Slowly, with the terrifying grace of falling boys. The flying demons landed at opposite ends of the clearing, boxing the boys into a kill zone of ash and embers.
Fire and oily black smoke swirled around their towering, obsidian forms as they began their advance. Each footfall was a heavy, deliberate thud that vibrated through the boys' ribcages—the slow, predatory march of a hunter who knows the prey has reached a dead end. Their glowing eyes, twin pits of burning sulfur, reflected the sheer, unadulterated terror on the boys' faces as the noose of shadow tightened.
There were no more paths. No more shortcuts. Nowhere left to run.
Gopi collapsed, squeezing his eyes shut as he curled into a ball, a silent sob shaking his frame. Arjun followed, his strength finally failing him. He pressed his face into the dirt, the smell of burnt earth filling his lungs, and braced himself for the cold, final embrace of the death approaching them.
✦ THE MYSTERY MAN ✦
The night broke, it shattered under the weight of a blinding, kinetic arc.
A single stroke of white lightning cleaved through the air, followed by the wet, clinical sound of steel parting bone. The first demon was sliced at the waist—its upper torso sliding away with a grotesque slowness while its massive legs remained standing for a singular, horrifying heartbeat before fell into the dust.
The second beast barely had time to register the kill. Its right arm was shorn away in a spray of black ichor, and as it threw its head back to see the source of the strike, a second flash descended. The blade split the monster's skull vertically, from crown to jaw, with the sound of tearing parchment. The two halves of the head hit the dirt with a dull, final thud.
Silence rushed back into the clearing, heavy and absolute.
As the boys forced their eyes open through the coiling smoke, they saw him. A lone figure standing amidst the fresh carnage, his stance radiating the practiced stillness of a veteran warrior. He held a sword that hummed with a low, rhythmic vibration, arcs of residual electricity dancing along the blade like captive spirits.
The flickering orange light of the forest fire licked across his features, and Arjun's world tilted.
"Papa?" he whispered, the word a fragile thread in the dark.
It was Nandvarman.
Even with the familiar police cap pulled low over his brow, he was unrecognizable. The rugged, bearded face of the village constable had been replaced by a mask of sovereign authority and iron resolve. He stood broad-shouldered against the encroaching rot, looking less like a lawman and more like a legend carved from stone. It was as if the demonic storm simply did not have the permission to touch the space he occupied.
In a frantic surge of relief, Arjun and Gopi scrambled toward him. Nandvarman dropped to one knee, the crackling sword still in his hand, and pulled both boys into a crushing, protective embrace. He shielded them with his massive frame, anchoring them to the reality of the earth. For a fleeting moment, the screams of the forest and the stench of blood seemed to vanish behind the scent of his old wool jacket and gun oil.
When he finally pulled back, his hands remained steady on their shoulders, but his eyes were sharp, searching theirs with a piercing, urgent intensity.
"How?" he asked, his voice a low rumble. "How did you end up out here, in the very heart of this forest?"
Gopi's voice was a jagged mess of stammers as the words spilled out in a frantic rush—the arrival of the towering monsters, the terrifying revelation of the serpent mark, and the impossible explosion of blue fire that had saved them from the brink of death.
Nandvarman listened in a heavy, stony silence. His face remained an unreadable mask of granite, though his grip tightened ever so slightly on the hilt of his weapon as the details of Arjun's power came to light.
"We have no more time for talk," Nand spoke at last, his voice a low, commanding rumble that brooked no argument. "The jungle is no longer a hiding place; it is a trap. We must cut through the main forest road and reach the settlement at the base of the temple hill. We will gather whatever survivors remain there and make a final, desperate dash for the sanctuary."
As he spoke, Arjun's gaze was drawn—almost magnetically—to the weapon in his father's hand. The blade was a masterpiece of celestial geometry, humming with a soft, rhythmic pulse of light that seemed to harmonize with the very air.
"Papa…" Arjun whispered, his awe momentarily eclipsing his terror. "That sword… what is it?"
Nand glanced down at the shimmering steel, a flicker recognition crossing his eyes. "The Sword of Mercy," he replied. "A relic of a forgotten age. It is drawn only when the very existence of mankind is threatened."
Reaching into a pouch at his belt, he withdrew two small, silk-wrapped bundles of sacred sandalwood ash and pressed them firmly into the boys' palms.
"Take this," he ordered. "The ash is consecrated. If the demons draw near and I am not by your side, throw it with everything you have. It will buy you the seconds you need to survive."
He stood abruptly, his presence expanding to fill the clearing. "Now, stay close and move with caution. We get out of this forest first; the rest of your questions will have to wait for a world that isn't burning."
Without another word, Nandvarman turned and broke into a disciplined, powerful run toward the tree line. Arjun and Gopi exchanged one final, wide-eyed look before plunging into the shadows after him.
✦ TOWARDS THE VILLAGE ✦
Three figures burst out from the forest's edge as if fleeing the jaws of the abyss itself.
Behind them, the jungle still roared with demonic cries and crackling flames, but the narrow forest road ahead offered a fragile promise of escape. Moonlight—tainted crimson by the eclipse—spilled through the branches, revealing a lone motorcycle resting beneath a massive banyan tree. Its sidecar leaned slightly, dust-covered and silent, as though waiting for its purpose to be fulfilled.
Verman reached it first.
He paused only long enough to draw a deep breath, the weight of the moment settling onto his shoulders. The air smelled of smoke and ash. Somewhere far behind them, something screamed—not in pain, but in rage.
Verman turned to the boys.
His eyes were sharp, battle-hardened, yet reassurance in them—a sort of calmness.
"Listen carefully," Nandvarman said, with a commanding voice. He turned to his son, his eyes boring into Arjun's with a piercing clarity. "Arjun, a month ago I taught you the mechanics of the rifle. I didn't do it for sport, and I didn't do it for the hunt."
He reached into the motorcycle's sidecar and retrieved the weapon. The cold barrel glinted with a lethal silver shine under the sickly, hemorrhaging moonlight. When he pressed the rifle into Arjun's hands, the boy felt the weight of it settle in his marrow—it wasn't just the weight of steel, but the crushing gravity of a sudden, forced maturity.
"Tonight," Verman continued, his tone shifting into that of a commander on a battlefield, "you do not fire for practice. You fight to protect the spark of life itself."
Arjun swallowed hard, his knuckles turning white as his fingers found the familiar grooves of the stock. "I won't fail, Papa," he whispered.
Beside him, Gopi hovered on the edge of a collapse, his gaze darting between the heavy weapon and the winged nightmares circling the canopy. "Uncle..." he stammered, his breath hitching. "Do you truly mean we have to... we have to use that on those things?"
Verman's jaw tightened, "I do. But listen well—ordinary lead will pass through an Asura like smoke through a screen. To them, a standard bullet is a mere nuisance."
He reached into his heavy coat and withdrew a leather pouch filled with more of that shimmering, pale sandalwood ash. "This is the poison to their plague. Coat every casing. Dip the tip of every round into this dust before you chamber it. One of you loads, the other fires. You have to act together, or you do not act at all. Trust each other—that is the only way you survive the dawn."
He looked at them one last time, a brief flash of the father softening the mask of the warrior. Then, he turned his gaze back to the darkness. There was no more time for doubt.
They mounted the motorcycle. The engine roared to life, slicing through the night like a war cry. Verman drove with ruthless focus, weaving through the forest road as shadows swooped overhead. Whenever a ground demon dared approach, his sword flashed—swift, precise, merciless—cutting them down before they could even scream.
From the sidecar, a different battle raged.
Gopi's fingers moved fast despite their shaking, rolling bullets through ash, snapping them into place. Arjun fired—once, twice, again—each shot ripping a demon from the sky in a burst of flame and fury.
A strange, electric thrill surged through Arjun, a spark of defiance cutting through the cold dread.
"They work!" he shouted, his voice barely audible over the guttural roar of the engine and the whistling wind. "Gopi—look! They actually fall!"
Gopi stared in paralyzed awe as another winged shadow spiraled toward the earth. "We're not helpless..." he whispered, the realization hitting him like a physical blow. "We can actually fight back."
But the light of hope in Arjun's eyes quickly curdled into something far more dangerous. His jaw clenched and his gaze turned predatory as he watched another demon scream in agony, its wings dissolving into ash.
"I'll kill every one of these bastards," he growled, hus words dripped with hatred. "For the screams. For every innocent soul they tore apart. This isn't just survival anymore—this is my revenge."
Before Gopi could voice the concern blooming in his chest, a piercing shriek shattered the air—a human scream, raw and desperate, coming from just beyond the next bend.
Verman's entire frame stiffened, his knuckles whitening on the handlebars.
"The village," he said, his voice a grim, hollow echo. "We're already too late." He shook his head. "I didn't think they could have pushed this deep so quickly. This is the last threshold before the temple hill."
As the road opened up before them, the nightmare became a landscape.
Flickering orange light danced between the silhouettes of crumbling huts. Shadows, elongated and violent, thrashed against the walls. The air was thick with the scent of ozone, burning thatch, and copper. The screams multiplied; they merged into a single, agonizing wall of sound.
They were breaching the village outskirts now.
Arjun raised the rifle to his shoulder once more, His eyes were no longer those of a boy; they were twin beacons of cold resolve. Beside him, Gopi swallowed the bile rising in his throat, his hands shaking but precise as he continued to coat and chamber the rounds.
The path ahead was paved in fire, and there was no turning back.
...