There was no floor beneath him. No sky above. Only an infinite expanse of darkness that breathed.
Rudra stood—if standing was the word—in the center of the void, his body weightless, painlessly drifting. But he remembered pain. He remembered Amber's tears, Jade's blood, the helplessness in his own shaking hands.
Then came the sound.
A beat—like a drum made from the bones of dying stars. A rhythm ancient and terrifying. And from that rhythm, a figure emerged..
A figure stepped into the void, not from it. He did not emerge, like he was the void.
A being of unbearable beauty and horror, its every movement shattered light and stitched it back together. Galaxies unraveled beneath its feet. Stars were born in its wake only to collapse into blackness again. It had no face, or many. Its arms moved like rivers of time. Its eyes—one blazing, one void—pierced through the illusion of self.
He was divine—and yet not beautiful.
He was beautiful—and yet not kind.
He was everything the cosmos feared and worshipped.
His body shimmered with stars and rot. His face shifted—half radiant with grace, half broken by chaos. One eye burned like the sun, the other swallowed light like a black hole. His limbs were serpents and comets. His breath birthed constellations, and his exhale erased them.
And then—
He danced.
Not as a man, nor a god.
But as the principle of all things: the Dancer of Ends.
Each movement shattered a law of reality. Each turn unraveled dimensions. Stars were flung like sparks from his feet, galaxies folded under his heel. Creation cracked, time wept, space convulsed.
Planets bled. Moons screamed. Light lost its memory.
And at the center of it all—he danced. With ecstasy. With fury. With the laughter of madness and the stillness of saints.
He was ********—the Beautiful Horror, the Creator and the Ruin.
And when he opened his third eye, even the dream died.
—
Rudra awoke,
He woke with a gasp.
His lungs strained, each breath shallow and sharp. Bandages crisscrossed his torso, pain bloomed with every twitch. The white walls of the room spun around him, the scent of medicinal oils thick in the air.
His chest felt like it had been flattened under a mountain. His mouth was dry. His limbs, heavy.
"Easy, easy," a familiar voice said gently.
Rudra turned his head. His uncle Ishaan sat beside the bed, wearied but upright, a trembling hand half-raised as if caught between reaching and praying.
Their eyes met.
Relief cracked Ishaan's expression.
"You're awake," he whispered. "By the stars... you're awake."
Rudra tried to speak. His voice came as a croak. "How... how long?"
"Three days," Ishaan said. "You've been unconscious for three days. You almost didn't make it."
Memories slammed into him—Amber falling, Jade screaming, the shadows in the forest.
He tried to sit up. A bolt of pain dropped him back. "Amber. Jade... are they—?"
"They're alive," Ishaan said quickly. "You were lucky. All three of you. A Level Three healer was stationed nearby, passing through with a royal envoy. If she hadn't arrived..."
He didn't finish the sentence.
Rudra closed his eyes, exhaling hard. "They're here?"
"Same wing. Resting. Stable. They'll make full recoveries."
Tension drained from Rudra's bruised body. He lay there in silence, heart still echoing with the dream.
He had no words.
Only images.
Only feeling.
Something in him had been broken.
Something in him had been born.
For the first time in his life, he hungered—not for power, not for glory—
—but for understanding.
Who was that being?
What was that dance?
Why did it feel like... it had been waiting for him?
He did not yet know.
But in that moment, the boy who only wanted peace...
was touched by the truth of the divine.
And something within him whispered:
"To find meaning, you must burn."
Rudra was lost in the thought.
There was silence.
Then Ishaan leaned forward. His voice grew firm.
"Now do you understand? Why I kept pushing you? Why I begged you to take this seriously? This world... it is not fair. It is not soft. The strong carve peace for themselves. The weak are left to pray for it."
Rudra didn't argue.
"You almost died. You saw your friends bleed. If someone stronger hadn't appeared..."
"I know," Rudra said, barely above a whisper.
"Good," Ishaan said. "Because you need to make a choice, Rudra. Not for me. Not for them. For you. What are you going to do now?"
Rudra didn't answer immediately..
He looked down at his injured hands. At the tubes snaking into his skin. At the bandages covering his caved chest.
. Through the nearby window, the sky had turned a dull gray, flecks of rain whispering against the glass. The city below was still bustling, but in this room, the world felt paused.
Rudra remembered laughter. Teasing Amber, baiting Jade. The crown of flowers. The scent of old trees.
He also remembered how quickly it had turned to blood.
He turned to Ishaan, who now stared into the floor.
"I thought peace meant being untouched by conflict," Rudra went on, voice low. "I thought it meant staying quiet, staying small. I thought if I didn't fight, I'd never lose."
He laughed bitterly.
"But the world doesn't wait for your permission. It just takes."
He swung his legs off the bed slowly. Every muscle screamed. Every nerve trembled. Ishaan reached out, but Rudra raised a hand.
He dropped to his knees.
His breathing was labored, but his voice came steady.
"I was weak. Because I chose to be. I believed peace came to those who avoided conflict. I was wrong."
He raised his head, eyes clearer than they had ever been.
"I swear—by the pain I felt, by the blood we shed, —I will walk the path of the strongest. I will carve peace with my own hands. And no one—no one—will take it from me again."
Ishaan stared at him, eyes wide, then closed them and nodded.
The boy before him was no longer the same.
"You'll have to endure more pain than you've ever known," he said quietly.
Rudra nodded. "I've already started."
The rain picked up outside.
And inside that small room, something ancient stirred.
Not in the walls. Not in the sky.
In Rudra.
The world had turned.
And a fire had finally begun to burn.