The Ahankari general, a man who had seen a hundred battlefields and felt no fear, now stared in disbelief. His cruel smile had vanished, replaced by a mask of pure terror. The blinding golden light radiating from Karan was not the fragile magic of a child, but the raw, unadulterated power of a cosmic being. The polished obsidian armor on the general's body, a symbol of his supposed invincibility, began to crack and shatter under the sheer force of the energy, its fragments scattering across the blood-stained floor like shards of glass. The very air, once thick with the stench of death and violence, now crackled with a divine, terrifying energy that felt like a living storm. The general, a veteran of countless battles, had never seen anything like this. It was as if he were facing a god, not a boy.
Karan stood up, a figure reborn from the ashes of two tragedies. The innocent face of Prince Karan Raymond was gone, replaced by the grim, determined countenance of Suryaputra Karna. His eyes, once a gentle brown, now burned with a fierce, golden light that was the very essence of the sun. He didn't need a sword. He didn't need a shield. The golden light coalesced around his body, forming a shimmering, ethereal armor, a perfect echo of the Kavach and Kundal he had been born with. It was a power that felt both ancient and new, a perfect fusion of his past and present lives. The scars of his former self, the wounds of a broken man, had been fused with the unblemished strength of a god.
He raised a hand, and the golden energy swirled into the form of a magnificent bow, its surface a molten gold and its string humming with a sound that was both a divine melody and a silent threat. It was not a weapon of war, but of righteous fury. He looked at the Ahankari general, his voice, now deep and resonant, holding the weight of two lifetimes.
"You said I was weak," Karna said, his voice as cold as ice. Each word was a hammer blow against the general's sanity, an unbearable weight of accusation. "You said I failed my duty. You were right. In my last life, I was cursed to be powerless. I was a man who had everything, yet could protect nothing. In this life, I chose to be powerless, for I craved a peace that could not exist." His words were a direct refutation of the choices he had made, a raw display of the agony he had endured. "But now, the curses are broken. The seal is shattered. I am no longer a prince. I am no longer a victim. I am the one who has returned to collect a debt. And the first payment is your life."
With a speed that defied mortal eyes, the golden bow released a bolt of light. It didn't pierce the general; instead, it hit the shattered remains of the armory door behind him, and from that point, a wave of golden energy expanded outward, pushing back the remaining Ahankari forces with the force of a tidal wave. Their swords and spears shattered against the invisible force field, and their armor crumpled like tinfoil. They screamed in terror, retreating as fast as their legs could carry them, convinced they were fighting a god.
Karna stepped over his father's body, his expression a mask of cold resolve. The child who had lost his father was gone, replaced by a warrior who had lost everything twice over. His heart was a fortress of ice, fueled by the fire of revenge. The peaceful life he had craved was now nothing more than a ghost, a beautiful lie he was willing to bury forever. He looked at the wreckage of his home, at the silent, terrified faces of the surviving servants and guards. They saw a monster, a force of nature they could not comprehend, a being whose rage was so immense it felt like the sun itself was falling to earth.
But Karna was not a monster. He was an avenger. He had been mocked twice, humiliated twice, and this time, he would make his enemies pay for both lives. He had walked the path of peace and found only despair. Now, he would walk the path of war and see where his karma would lead him. His journey had just begun.