"Not a single tear."
A handsome young boy with a chiselled, diamond-shaped face and no beard or moustache whispered. He sat beside a dying man, whose torso bore deep, fatal wounds. The older man, with brown eyes and graying brown hair, lay motionless—his breath ragged.
"Don't you think I'm really Voidheart, Father? Just like they say?" Sharv asked, his voice soft but laced with sadness.
"A Voidheart, you say… yet here you are, sounding sad," his father, Shyam, replied in a hoarse, breaking voice. "Even if you're faking it, that means you understand what sadness is, Sharv."
Sharv loosened his neck and lowered his gaze. His obsidian eyes dimmed in the moonlight.
"Sharv," Shyam continued, "the light of my life is already slipping into the darkness of death. I had hoped to walk beside you... but now, you must go alone."
He paused to catch a breath, blood escaping from his lips.
"The trial ground is called the Forest of Death."
Sharv remained silent, letting his father's words settle like dust.
"Under my cot… in the bedroom," Shyam rasped, "a small box is buried. You'll need it to pass the trial."
Sharv gently supported his father's back as Shyam coughed again.
"And son…" Shyam added, voice nearly gone, "Promise me… that you'll do what you did today… whenever needed. Let your actions reveal your emotions. And never again… call yourself Voidheart."
With one final breath and a weak cough, Shyam's soul left his body.
Sharv looked at the corpses lying nearby. Then his gaze shifted toward the horizon.
The sun of his life, the one who had guided him until now, had set. Simultaneously, the first rays of the morning sun were peeking over the horizon, messengers of its rise. Then he looked west, down the small hill. There, the intense, dancing flames consuming the nearby forest gave the impression of a second sun, one that had forgotten its path across the sky.
Earlier that night...
Sharv lay on the grass in his yard, under a clear sky. Midnight had passed; it was almost three of the morning. A gentle breeze flowed, soothing the sultry night. Sharv was gazing at the Trident Constellation, his obsidian eyes reflecting the full moon.
"You didn't sleep tonight either, Sharv?" a tired, hoarse voice asked.
A man lay on a cot beside him—his father, Shyam.
"It's a happy day," Shyam continued. "You've finally mastered the fifth stage of the first five chakras after rigorous training. Don't you feel happy or satisfied?"
"I am happy, Father," Sharv said in a neutral, deep voice—unusual for a sixteen-year-old. "But I want to conquer sleep."
"Conquer sleep, huh?" Shyam said with a weak laugh. "Why?"
"Two reasons," Sharv answered. "When I started mastering the Space Chakra… I began having a dream. An army of humans and unknown creatures, enveloped in flames, stood before me. And I was the only one fighting."
He turned his gaze to the moon, his long, wavy black hair glowing faintly.
"I decided I would train until I could beat that army. But every time I fought, I died and woke up."
Shyam looked at his son with a compassionate gaze.
"So dying in your dreams made you stop sleeping?"
"No," Sharv replied. "Since sleep is where I can't win, I decided I would train rather than sleep."
He paused, then spoke with a determined look, "And if that army is real… it would take a year of non-stop fighting to beat them. To fight for a year, I have to stay awake. So conquering sleep became a necessity—a precaution."
"So that's why you haven't slept properly in two years." Shyam gave a long, tired sigh and spoke again, "But you should call it a nightmare, not a dream, Son."
"It's all the same to me," Sharv replied quietly. "I don't feel emotions in my heart. You know… they call me…"
But before he could finish, screams erupted from the southern end of the village, filled with agony and despair.
Sharv shot up instantly. At nearly six feet tall, his shoulder- long hair flowed in the gentle breeze. He grabbed his wooden training sword and ran toward the fence.
"Son!" Shyam shouted behind him. "At least take a real sword!"
"Wooden is enough," Sharv replied, leaping over the fence and into the unknown.
He ran with all his might and reached the southern part of the village in a few seconds. As he reached the southern crossroad, an open black car and a truck were parked. On the roads, women were running away with their children, hoping to escape and live another day, while men were trying to fight the dacoits who had attacked. Sharv could see over fifty men wearing black pants and shirts, carrying various weapons such as swords, spears, and maces, as they jumped out of the truck.
Sharv immediately joined the fight. His lower pelvis region glowed faintly in brown light, and a brown, crystalline metallic material covered his sword, generating from his hand and moving towards the tip. It reinforced and sharpened the sword, fusing it to his hand. A dacoit was going to slash a woman from behind, but before one could blink, first his hand, then his head fell to the ground, lifeless. Even in death, his eyes were wide open with surprise.
"A Master!" other Dacoits who saw this scene shouted. "Stay away from that man, he is a Master. We can't fight him."