I didn't wake.I returned.
Not like rousing from a dream. Not like a slow rise into reality. It was more like being pulled—violently—through layers of silence and ash, through smoke-thick memory and something older than time. My breath caught before it ever reached my lungs.
I was not reborn.
I was reforged.
My body felt... new. Not in the way fresh wounds feel raw or numb. But in the way metal feels after it's been hammered under divine fire—reshaped, redefined, repurposed. Every cell in me pulsed with an awareness that had never been mine before. Something was awake inside me. Watching through my skin.
The sky above was no longer violet.
The stars had returned to their proper places. The unnatural silence of the night had broken, replaced by the occasional whisper of wind through the trees. The forest had stilled again—but not in peace.
In waiting.
The orb was gone. The rift had vanished. The temple ruin behind me was untouched by fire or quake. And yet… nothing was the same.
Because I wasn't.
I sat up slowly, my spine rigid. The moment I moved, I felt it—the mark.
Not a tattoo. Not a burn. A presence carved into the very current of my nerves. It pulsed—alive. Like a second heartbeat buried beneath my own, hidden deep in the muscles of my back.
Not pain. Not exactly.
More like a heat that remembered fire. A heat that knew what it had once been, and refused to forget. Each throb carried with it something ancient. Something watching.
I rose to my feet.
The temple's remains loomed behind me—silent, moss-covered, bones of a god that had once been worshipped here. The vines that coiled over the broken stones had curled tighter, as if recoiling from something they didn't understand.
The shattered face of Shiva lay half-buried in mud, his eyes smoothed to nothing by time—but even in that erosion, I could feel something judging me.
No crater marked the place where the orb had descended. No smoke. No scorch. The forest floor was as it had always been. Yet the air was heavier. Thicker. Like something sacred had passed through and left its scent behind.
Like incense after prayer.
And beneath it all was that metallic tang. Blood? No. Older. Iron-rich, but sterile. Sacred. Something I could taste on the back of my tongue. Power.
Then I saw movement.
Just beyond the last broken pillar of the temple—where the trees began again—stood a figure.
Still. Watching.
At first, I thought it was human. The outline made me believe it. Arms. Legs. A head tilted at a questioning angle. But the longer I looked, the more wrong it became.
It stepped forward.
Too fluid. Too deliberate.
The thing's skin was ash-grey, as if carved from burnt flesh. No eyes. Just empty sockets. Its jaw hung open slightly, revealing no teeth, no tongue—only void.
Its limbs were too long. Its arms bent slightly the wrong way at the elbow. Its spine seemed too loose for bone.
It stopped.
Then it twitched.
And moved.
Fast.
Before I could blink, it was in front of me. One clawed arm raised. Fingers outstretched. No scream. No howl. Just movement. Pure, deathless intent.
I didn't think.I didn't breathe.I just raised my arms in front of me, helpless.
And then—The mark ignited.
Not in flame. Not in light. But in something deeper. A current. A river. A scream buried in fire.
Heat surged up my spine like molten blood, snaking through nerves, exploding into my chest, my shoulders, my arms—
And then—my hands.
They glowed.
Pale gold. Streaked with red, like sunlight warped by blood. Not flame. Not light. Energy. Living, breathing energy pouring from my skin as if it had always been waiting.
I met the creature's chest with my palm.
There was no resistance.
There was no impact.
It just… ceased.
The moment my hand touched it, it unmade. Folded inward. Black smoke erupted from its core and evaporated into the trees above, like a curse fleeing the light.
I sat there for a long time after.
Breathing.
Staring at my hand.
The light shimmered once more—then faded.
My skin was unmarred. My body intact. But the forest no longer felt like a place I belonged to. It felt like something that had opened its eyes and was now curious about me.
I had become part of it.
And it had become part of me.
The silence didn't last.
Not in the usual way. Not with footsteps or rustling leaves. But with awareness.
A presence, just beyond sight.
And then, a voice.
"Don't turn around yet."
It was soft. Calm. Human.
But the forest didn't echo it.
"I saw you from the ridge," the voice said. "That thing—it was feeding on the air. You burned it."
I turned anyway.
A girl stood there. Barefoot. Mud-streaked. Her shawl was drenched and torn, clinging to her thin frame. A satchel hung from one shoulder. A wooden staff rested in her hand—gnarled and carved with worn symbols.
She looked… young. My age, maybe. Seventeen. Eighteen.
But her eyes—
Her eyes were older than fire.
"Who are you?" I asked.
She stepped closer, staff tapping gently on the stone.
"My name is Ananya," she said. "I'm a Vessel."
I blinked. "A what?"
She crouched and began drawing something in the mud with her staff.
"You've awakened," she said. "You bear the mark. You saw the vision. You survived the pulse."
I said nothing.
She looked up at me, gauging my silence.
"Then we don't have time," she said. "Come with me."
"I don't know who you are. I don't even know what I am."
"I don't know everything either," she replied, standing. "But I know enough."
She reached into her satchel and pulled out a folded paper, yellowed and torn at the edges.
A hand-drawn diagram.
A human silhouette. Six markings etched along the spine, head, and hands. Each inscribed with Sanskrit glyphs.
"The Vedas," she said. "Chosen bearers. Carriers of divine fire. Each tied to an aspect of the Devi or Deva they resonate with."
I stared at the diagram.
One marking sat just below the neck. Radiating outward. The spot where my back still throbbed.
She pointed to it.
"Ajna chakra. The third eye. Only those marked here can survive more than one invocation."
"Invocation?" I asked. "Of… what?"
"Divinity," she said simply.
I shook my head. "And how do you know all this?"
She looked away. Her voice was quieter when she answered.
"Because my brother was one."
We walked through the forest in silence, our footsteps soft against the damp soil.
Every so often, Ananya would stop and glance toward the treetops. Her posture never relaxed. Her grip on the staff never loosened.
"The thing that attacked me," I asked, "what was it?"
"We call them Pale Ones," she said. "They aren't born. They aren't made. They're left behind. By the war. By the rift."
"War?"
"Long ago," she said, "the gods didn't leave. They were sealed. And where their energy pooled, those things began to crawl."
I frowned. "And now they're back?"
"They're drawn to us," she said. "To power. Especially the unstable kind."
"Like mine."
She nodded.
"They feed on divine residue," she continued. "A living Veda is like a beacon to them. You'll have more coming."
I felt the mark throb again.
Not pain.Not warning.
Calling.
We reached a small hut just before dawn.
It was built from mud and stone, tucked into the corner of a clearing that smelled of wet bark and sandalwood. Inside was sparse: a single cot, a trishul broken in half and wrapped in cloth, an oil lamp still flickering on the altar.
Ananya set down her satchel and pulled a copper bowl from it.
"You need rest," she said. "You won't survive the next pulse without stabilizing the bond."
"What does that mean?"
"Every Veda undergoes a trial," she replied, lighting incense near the altar. "The goddess marked you. But the fire inside you doesn't belong to you yet. You have to claim it."
"And how do I do that?"
She handed me the bowl.
"Drink," she said. "Then sleep. She'll come for you again. This time, not to choose you."
I stared into the bowl.
The water inside shimmered faintly, as if stirred by unseen hands.
And then—
For a second—only a second—My reflection blinked.
And the eyes looking back at me were violet.