Word of clandestine midnight chanting had drifted through campus rumors. Students spoke of strange lights beneath the Mathematics building, of whispered mantras darker than the blackest night. Amrit and Radhika—and quietly, Ashwin—had pieced together enough hints to suspect a Shadow Cult: a group of awakened students worshipping an ancient Asura.
They gathered before the deserted lecture hall at 2 AM, armed only with their elemental mastery and unshakable resolve. Ashwin carried a small vial of saffron-infused water from the Sarasvati shrine; Radhika gripped her polished conch; Amrit's fists glowed faintly with inner flame.
"Ready?" Amrit asked in a whisper.
They nodded and pushed open the side door, slipping into the humid underbelly of the building: tunnels of ventilation shafts and maintenance corridors. Following the echo of chanting, they descended a ladder into an undercroft—an abandoned projector room now converted into a ritual chamber.
Candles formed a pentagram of black wax on the floor, and hooded figures knelt at each point, heads bowed. At the center, a tall student—one Dr. Banerjee's protégé from Advanced Algorithms—stood chanting in reverse Sanskrit. His robes were stained with crimson kumkum; an ornate dagger lay before him.
Amrit's heart pounded. The blade's handle bore the same snake-lotus sigil once inscribed on Satish's corrupted collar.
Radhika nudged Amrit. "We can't let them complete this."
Amrit nodded. He raised his palm and murmured the Sutra of the Inner Flame. A flickering barrier of golden light sprang to life around the three awakened.
Immediately, the chanting ceased. The hooded figures sprang up, eyes glowing with malignant light. Dr. Banerjee's protégé laughed—a dry, hollow sound.
"You think you can stop progress?" he sneered. "Nirriti's light is freedom from mortal weakness."
He raised the cursed dagger. Black mist swirled around its blade. "Who will stand with me?"
A dozen silhouettes emerged from the shadows—students twisted by dark mantras, their auras frayed.
Amrit set his jaw. "We stand for dharma, not decay."
He unleashed a torrent of flaming wind: palms blazed as he expelled vortices of fire and air, sending the first wave of cultists crashing into walls. Radhika lifted her conch to her lips and blew, calling forth a resounding Om, and a ripple of pure pranic light washed through the chamber, dispelling dark illusions from the second wave.
Ashwin dashed forward, sprinkling saffron water across the floor. Wherever the droplets touched, lashes of white flame roared to life, encircling the remaining cultists and pinning them in place without harming their flesh.
The protégé's sneer faltered. He launched the dagger at Amrit—but Amrit caught it mid-flight with a flaming gauntlet. The black mist hissed as it met the elemental flames. Amrit withdrew his hand, and the dagger clattered to the ground, its curse burned off.
The cultists slumped, freed from their trance. Their eyes cleared as they stared at each other in confusion and shame.
The protégé spat on the floor. "You may have stopped this—but the darkness stirs in silent hearts."
Amrit retrieved the dagger and hefted it. Its blade was now dull silver, the black aura gone. He looked to Radhika and Ashwin. "This must be purified."
They formed a circle around the blade. Radhika blew her conch, Ashwin's saffron water and Amrit's inner flame combined into a swirl of golden energy. The blade glowed briefly, then burst into harmless ash that drifted away in a breeze.
Amrit turned to the subdued cultists, now free from mental thrall. "You've been led astray," he said quietly. "But you're still part of this world. Choose dharma, not despair."
One by one they bowed their heads. The chamber, once suffused with shadows, felt lighter—sunlight cupping dawn's first glow seeping in through vents.
As the three awakened left the building, dawn brushed the horizon. Amrit pocketed the final piece of ash from the dagger's curse—an omen that darkness could be cleansed, if only hearts remained steadfast.
But in his mind lingered a warning: The cult leader escaped.
He clenched his fists. The battle for dharma had intensified. Yet Amrit felt steadier now—guarded by inner flame, conch, and saffron fire, and bonded with friends whose convictions shone as brightly through the darkest night.
The ritual had been simple—on the surface.
Amrit sat within a ring of salt, copper coins, and sandalwood powder under the banyan tree beside the abandoned Shiva shrine near the IITM botanical garden. He had drawn the sacred Yamadvitiya Yantra using turmeric paste and ghee, replicating an ancient design he'd found hidden in one of the palm-leaf manuscripts from Sarasvati's shrine.
Tonight, the veil would thin. Patala—one of the nether Lokas—was accessible only during specific planetary alignments, when the shadow of the mortal world dipped into the Vedic underworld. Amrit's goal was not conquest. It was understanding. The last remnants of the corrupted dagger had whispered a name again and again in his dreams: Naraka.
He wanted to see the truth. But the truth, he soon learned, bites.
As the mantras echoed in his lungs, and his breath stabilized into the Ananta Kumbhaka—a timeless, suspended inhale—Amrit's vision blurred. The ground fell away.
Then silence.
The world turned gray, and when color returned, it was crimson.
He stood at the edge of a great, mist-choked ravine. The air was hot, thick with the iron scent of blood and rot. Cracked earth bled black ichor. Ash fell like snow. He was no longer on campus. This was not India. Not the physical one.
This was the threshold of Naraka.
In the far distance, towering citadels of bone and shadow stretched toward a blood-red sky. Chains hung from clouds. Screams, faint and echoing, swirled in the wind like lost prayers.
Amrit's first step sent a jolt through his spirit—each breath a test of will. His body, though still tethered to the real world, was phantom-thin here. His spirit-form shimmered, flickering between substance and light.
A low growl echoed behind him.
He turned.
A massive figure emerged from the ash—a Rakshasa, ten feet tall, skin molten-black with tattoos of flame. It wore the crown of a minor judge of the underworld—Yamabhakta, the Scorched Warden.
"You do not belong here," the creature boomed. "Yet you tread the Gates of Judgment. What claim have you?"
Amrit stood firm. "I seek truth. I seek the source of imbalance in dharma."
The Rakshasa sneered. "Many seek. Few endure."
It raised a whip of bones—ready to lash him into submission.
Instinct surged.
Amrit fell into the breath. His core burned, the Pranayama Scroll's inner spiral activating. From within his spiritual heart, a system window bloomed into view for the first time in days, glowing translucent blue across the air like a divine seal:
[SYSTEM UPDATE DETECTED]Astral Environment Recognized: YAMA LOKA BorderlandsInitiating Divine Perception Protocol...
REWARD UNLOCKED: "Mantra of Danda – Seal of Law"– A one-time astral invocation to summon a dharmic bond chain forged from the laws of cosmic balance.– Can be used once per realm traversal to subdue any adharmic being.
Use now? [Y/N]
"Yes," Amrit whispered.
From his outstretched palm, a golden shackle of burning Sanskrit mantras exploded outward. "DANDA!" he cried, invoking the divine symbol of cosmic punishment.
The Rakshasa froze mid-strike. Chains of light snapped around its arms, legs, throat, and waist. The creature shrieked, dropping its whip. The ashes beneath them quaked.
"Who taught you the name of judgment?" the Rakshasa howled.
Amrit stepped forward, eyes aflame. "The system you serve is imbalanced. I bring warning, not war. But test me again—and this judgment won't be the last."
The Rakshasa trembled, its chained form dissolving into black mist. The path ahead cleared.
The system chimed again:
Trial Passed: First Threshold of NarakaNew Reward Unlocked: "Yama's Left Eye – Veilpiercer Vision"– You may now perceive spiritual imbalances in beings or places.– Active once per day. Cooldown: 12 hours.– Warning: prolonged use causes karmic fatigue.
Amrit gasped as his vision swirled. His left eye throbbed, then adjusted. For a moment, everything sharpened: every flicker of movement in the shadows, every twist of spiritual essence in the air. He could see cracks in the sky itself.
And among them… a throne.
Blackened. Crumbling.
A skeletal figure barely seated upon it. Horns. Fangs. The outline of Yama himself—Lord of Death—but emaciated, decayed.
A voice echoed through the sky.
"The throne… trembles…"
A chill raced down Amrit's spine.
Then darkness swallowed everything.
He awoke gasping, back under the banyan tree.
Sweat drenched him. His limbs were numb. But the moon above was intact, and the world no longer bled.
In his mind's eye, the System Interface still glowed faintly:
New Trait Gained: Astral Resilience– Meditation and spiritual practices recover fatigue 3x faster in sacred spaces.
Side Quest Unlocked: Investigate the Fading of Yama's Throne– Clues may lie in Naraka, Patala, and among human karma accumulators.– Status: 1/3 locations touched.
Amrit didn't know how long he lay there. But one thing was certain: his journey was now more than personal growth. The cosmos itself had begun to crack, and he had walked into its wound.
And the System—his silent watcher—was no longer passive. It was guiding him. Nudging him. Preparing him.
The echoes of Naraka still clung to his bones, but within them now pulsed the rhythm of righteous fury.
He stood and whispered, "I won't let the throne fall."
He didn't notice that behind the tree's roots, an ethereal black lotus had bloomed.