Previously:
Ved's awakening has shaken the Sanctuary. Named a Flame-Born, he joins the First Flame Cell with Sia, Rehan, and Anya. But while he learns to burn fate itself, dark forces begin to stir — and ancient horrors wait to be found.
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"Some vaults are sealed not to protect what's inside… but to protect us from it."
– Black Archive Record #13, Redacted
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Location: Under-Delhi – Sector 27 Black Zone
A thin mist hovered over the ground.
The Flame Cell stood at the edge of a shattered metro tunnel, overgrown with glowing moss and rune-etched walls.
Agnira's voice crackled in Ved's ear:
> "Vault 27B. Sealed in 1999 after a rogue Yog-Script devoured an entire archaeological team."
Rehan adjusted his gloves. "Yog-Script? Isn't that—"
"Script that becomes conscious. It writes itself."
Sia added, "And rewrites reality around it. If it's active again, it could fold Delhi's physical laws."
Ved cracked his neck. "So we burn it?"
Agnira replied:
> "No. You erase it with your Code. That's what a Deva-Bearer does."
They entered.
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Inside Vault 27B
It was cold.
Too cold for Delhi.
Walls curved unnaturally — not with time, but intention. Ved felt like the air itself was watching.
Anya lit up a pulse orb. The walls pulsed back.
Sia whispered, "This place… remembers pain."
Suddenly, Rehan froze.
"There's something on the ceiling."
A soft scribble echoed.
Ved looked up.
And saw writing crawling across the stone. Moving.
"मृत्यु सत्य नहीं है… मृत्यु स्वयं एक जीवित भाषा है।"
(Death is not the truth… Death is a living language.)
The words slid down the walls, reaching toward them.
---
Combat Mode: Activated
Rehan clapped his hands — releasing a shockwave that froze the moving script midair.
Anya bent light around the team, shielding them in a prism-dome.
But Ved stood still.
The words were whispering to him.
"You are not bound. You are the breach."
Then—
A shadow burst from the script.
A humanoid form — all made of Sanskrit, like living paper — lunged at them.
Ved roared, and instinctively chanted:
"Om Agni Deva Rakshakaya Namah!"
His hands burst into gold-white fire — not burning, but unweaving the creature's body.
Sia reinforced with a psychic bolt. Rehan crushed its core with an echo-wave.
Silence returned.
But something was still wrong.
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Deeper Inside
They found a coffin-like stone case — covered in mantras, sealed with red wax.
A scanner revealed something inside.
Not a body.
A scroll.
Sia gasped. "This is one of the Saptarishi Seals — forbidden-level scripture. No one's opened one in decades."
Rehan joked, "Want to be the first in line to die?"
But Ved stepped forward.
The case opened by itself.
Inside, a scroll hovered in the air — glowing softly.
Ved heard a voice, not aloud but inside.
> "You are not reading me. I am reading you."
Suddenly, a flashback vision consumed him.
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Flashback Vision – Time Unknown
He stood in an ancient battlefield.
Mountains bled lightning. Celestial beings fought black flame serpents.
A man with glowing eyes turned to him — wearing the same flame sigil Ved bore on his back.
He spoke:
> "You are the Fifth. But not the last."
> "Guard the Code. Or all Deva-kind dies with you."
Then — darkness.
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Back in Vault 27B
Ved collapsed.
Sia caught him. "What did you see?"
He looked up, eyes flickering with white sparks.
"We're not the first."
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Meanwhile – Elsewhere
The Warden knelt before a throne made of broken mantras.
A figure sat above — face covered, voice deep.
"The Deva Seal has reacted," the figure said.
"And the Flame-Born?"
"Untrained… but stabilizing."
"Then it's time. Activate the Kali Pulse."
The Warden hesitated.
"But it will awaken the… Vaulted."
"So be it. Let the world remember why the scriptures were sealed."
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Sanctuary – Later that Night
Ved sat in the Archive Garden.
The scroll floated before him, unreadable now. Silent.
Agnira approached.
"You opened the first lock."
Ved replied, "What was that battlefield? That flame man?"
"History no one survived to record," she whispered. "You saw the Deva Civil War."
He frowned. "But why show me?"
"Because the war never ended, Ved. It just forgot its name."
And behind them, unseen —
The scroll glowed again.
And a second seal… cracked open.
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Next: A field mission goes wrong when a Class-3 Possession Entity hijacks a child's body in Mumbai. Can Ved burn possession without destroying the host? And what if the enemy wants to be caught?
Episode 8: The Hollow Child — coming next.