Jagan sat beneath the broken arch of the eastern temple, staring at the cracked stone where his father once meditated. The wind carried whispers—some real, some memory. He hadn't seen Karthi in four years. He didn't know if his brother was alive.
Ayothira had turned cold. The nobles who once bowed now spat. The ministers who praised now plotted. The Indrajeet name was a curse, a myth, a warning.
But Jagan remembered the teachings.
"Power is not shown. It is felt. And only the dying truly feel it."
His cultivation had begun in silence, far from the Rite of Flame. At twelve, he awakened alone, guided only by a relic buried beneath the temple ruins—a blade that hummed with his father's voice.
He was now fourteen. His cultivation level was far beyond what the world believed. But he kept it hidden. Let them underestimate. Let them strike.
Because when they did, they would see the truth.
And they would die with it.