Chapter 7 – The Fire That Didn't Burn
🌒 Night — Mountain Circle Sect
Ved sat in the guest quarters.
The room was clean. Too clean.
No windows. One candle.
He sharpened his senses, listening—beyond the walls, whispers moved like rats. Murmurs, distant footsteps, metal scraping stone.
He closed his eyes and sat cross-legged.
> "Dharma is not what you follow. It is what follows you."
The voice echoed—Krishna's voice, calm and ancient.
> "या निष्कामः, सः चिरंजीवी भवति।"
(He who moves without desire… becomes eternal.)
His eyes snapped open.
And the candle had gone out.
Not flickered—gone.
---
🔥 Beneath the Sect – Hidden Chamber
Three elders stood over the scroll.
The seal had been broken, but the scroll would not unroll.
> "It's resisting us," one said. "As if… alive."
> "It was meant for us. Why else would it arrive?"
The third elder frowned.
> "Perhaps it was meant to test us."
The first nodded, then channeled qi into the scroll.
That's when it happened.
A ring of fire erupted from the paper—silent and blue. It didn't burn the flesh. But it burned the mind.
The elders collapsed.
One screamed as memories that weren't his flooded in.
A vast battlefield. Flaming wheels. Chanting men in bronze armor. A warrior with a curved sword marked in gold.
And above them all…
A man standing still.
With peacock feathers behind his head, and a soft smile that stilled the world.
---
⛩️ Above — Guest Quarters
Ved staggered up.
His nose bled.
He hadn't seen the battlefield.
But he felt it.
> "Something is calling again…"
He gripped the sword at his waist—but not the hilt. His fingers wrapped around the scabbard, as if restraining it.
A voice whispered—not in words, but movement.
His body… moved.
He took a stance he'd never been taught.
Flowed into a second, then third.
The sword unsheathed.
Not slashed.
Sang.
> "This… isn't mine," Ved whispered. "Then whose memory is this?"
---
⚔️ Lower Grounds – Fire & Fear
The sect was in panic.
Two elders unconscious. One blind.
And the scroll—burned, but still intact.
But now the spokes were joined.
All eight.
Whole again.
The sect master spoke coldly:
> "That boy… is not from Murim."
> "But he came through Murim territory."
> "Exactly."
A pause.
> "Then we watch. We do not stop him."
---
🌫️ On the Road – Morning
Ved left early.
No one stopped him.
But someone watched.
From the treeline, the same stranger in red and white robes sat quietly, drawing something in the dirt.
It was a wheel.
With wings.
> "He'll need someone to protect him," the stranger said.
From behind a rock, a small figure stirred—too young to be a warrior, but his eyes glinted with knowledge far older than his age.
> "Not yet," the boy said. "But soon. We meet in the desert."
---