The world cracked.
Not from impact—but from the sound of divine silence.
Sharvaka stood amid the smoking crater Astha had thrown him into. His scythe, Shatvachan, spun once in the air before landing in his palm with impossible grace. No scratches marred his ash-white cloak. No sign of fatigue.
But something had changed.
A mark, faint yet ancient, had appeared on his hood:
The Glyph of Final Judgement.
Even the skies dimmed.
---
Sharvaka's Awakening
He lifted one hand.
Reality tore.
Lines of white flame etched themselves into the air, carving symbols that rotated like seals. A low, echoing chant—not from him, but from a choir of erased souls—filled the valley.
"I am the end of memory…
…the final word of gods unspoken."
The ground beneath Astha turned black. Not scorched. Unwritten. His boots sank into it as if history itself refused to remember this battle.
Naira gasped.
"He's using the Script of Nullity… the one that can unmake existence."
Luv charged forward anyway.
"I don't give a damn about your scripts."
His armor flared, turning silver with veins of stormlight. Thunder spears formed above him, spiraling into a cyclonic formation.
"You erase names—
I'll carve yours into the damn sky!"
CRACK-BOOM!
He hurled a bolt the size of a house.
It collided with Sharvaka—only for the divine executioner to raise a single hand and erase the thunder from reality.
The energy didn't explode.
It simply never existed.
---
Astha stepped forward, eyes glowing with mantra script.
Smritidhaara writhed along his back, alive with fire. Vaayutal hung in his right hand like a piece of molten wind. But the pressure in the air twisted—Sharvaka wasn't attacking anymore.
He was judging.
"You carry guilt and rage, Ash-Walker. But what justifies your defiance?"
"Nothing," Astha said. "Nothing except that the gods killed what I loved."
His voice cracked.
"So I'll burn everything they built."
Smritidhaara howled in reply, its sickle-end burning like the sun.
Astha stepped into the blackened ground. The glyphs clawed at his presence.
But he didn't vanish.
"You cannot erase me."
"Why?"
Astha gritted his teeth and roared:
"Because I remember!"
He spun, launching the blazing chain into the sky. It carved a symbol mid-air—a broken wheel, wreathed in smoke and fire.
"Vaakhshaastra—Second Syllable: Vidvansa."
The symbol detonated.
---
Sharvaka was sent hurtling backward, his cloak burning for the first time. The mark on his hood cracked. One of the divine seals anchoring him to the gods shattered.
He didn't fall.
He hovered, silently.
And then… he laughed.
It wasn't cruel.
It was surprised.
"So. This is what they feared."
His mask twisted slightly, revealing a human eye beneath.
"Your memory is not just rebellion. It is creation."
---
Luv regrouped beside Astha, electricity dancing along his skin, hair wild and golden eyes blazing.
"Next one's mine."
Naira floated above them, a mantra array behind her like wings of shifting script.
"We only get one shot at this."
Astha closed his eyes.
Vaayutal pulsed.
Smritidhaara vibrated.
His robe unfurled—revealing dozens of mantra tattoos, all glowing, all active.
"Then let's make it count."
---
Sharvaka raised both hands.
The sky opened.
Thousands of judgment scrolls fell from above, forming a dome of divine law. In the center, he began chanting—no words, only ancient syllables that ripped time.
Astha whispered to Luv:
"We can't win in power."
"Then how?"
"Break the law."
He stepped forward, eyes filled with light.
"Let's write a new one."