That frenzied demon had already crossed through the remaining soldiers in the blink of an eye. He moved like a crimson shadow in between them. He was so fast that many of them did not even realise what had happened until heads began flying in the sky.
One after another, more heads joined his gruesome collection.
By the time he neared his destination, four large garlands made entirely of severed heads already hung around his neck. Blood dripped from them continuously, leaving a crimson trail behind him.
Yet at the very end, one soldier remained standing with trembling legs; his face became pale from fear, and his heart was racing like a horse, yet he slowly pulled out his sword and raised it towards that upcoming monster.
"Even if I die," he shouted, forcing courage into his voice, "I will die as a soldier, not as a coward!"
The floating head behind them burst into laughter, "Nice... nice..." Its laughter echoed through the valley. "It is happening. This is the truth. Accept it, even if you die. Go forward!"
"Hahaha!"
The commander nodded while laughing madly. "Nice... very nice..." His bloodshot eyes stared at the soldier. "If all of you were like this, I wouldn't have needed to kill you all."
He slowly lifted his sword. "But now you have finally become a soldier." His smile widened. "I will give you a death worthy of one." Then his expression suddenly softened, almost becoming emotional as he stared at that floating head. "I need to kill him. Only then can I get Indira back," he continued in a trembling voice. "She promised she would return to me. Haha… Indira is coming back. With both of your deaths, everything will be completed."
The commander suddenly lunged forward. Steel collided against steel, sending a spray of sparks into the dark. The soldier fought with everything he had, but the difference between them was simply too great. The first strike rattled his bones and nearly shattered his guard. The second strike forced him backwards. The third strike shattered his stance and drove him onto one knee.
Then came the fourth; a cold flash of steel cut through the darkness, and the soldier's head split open beneath the commander's sword. With a thudding sound, the body collapsed heavily onto the ground.
The commander stood over the corpse; blood dripped from the edge of his blade, and then he spoke, "I promised, and I fulfilled it."
His gaze slowly moved towards that floating head. "Now you..." Unlike the others, that soldier's head did not join the garlands. Instead, it simply fell onto the blood-soaked earth as a brave man died in his battle.
The commander continued walking. Soon he reached the stone where the headless body remained. The body had been motionless until now but moved as he reached it. The headless corpse rose to its feet, and with unnatural movements, it posed as something divine resembling Natarajan, standing balanced and motionless beneath the dark sky. At that exact moment, lightning tore through the heavens.
BOOOOM!
The entire valley lit up for an instant, and in that blinding flash, that severed head rested between its raised palms. For a brief moment, even the commander was stunned, but he laughed seeing that a bizarre toy was performing a strange dance.
The headless body slowly began to dance with graceful yet terrifying movement. The more it danced, the more crimson lightning gathered within the clouds above. One after another, with 'BOOOM!' sounds, the bolt started to descend on his nearby area. Red lightning began falling around the dancing figure like rain.
One bolt shot directly towards the commander suddenly, and he also, without hesitation, swung his sword; lightning split apart. The first two, then three numbers of lightning bolts followed immediately. He destroyed them as well. The crimson figure standing behind him stepped forward; one lightning strike was blocked with its bare hand, and another was stopped with its sword.
Then four more bolts descended from the sky; three were destroyed, but the fourth struck directly. With a 'BOOOOM!' The red figure shattered completely.
Fragments of crimson energy exploded in every direction before dissolving into nothingness, and that frenzied commander was left alone; the illusion surrounding his mind weakened, the redness inside his eyes slowly faded, and the madness that had consumed him was no longer as overwhelming as before.
His breathing became heavier as his frenzied condition was getting solved; his smile disappeared, and he looked ahead and saw that the headless body was still dancing.
Around it, the severed head floated in circles, chanting strange mantras in an ancient rhythm. The sound was also being blended with the thunder overhead. Red lightning continued falling endlessly around the slave working area, just to illuminate it for a few breaths and make the darkness reclaim it again.
An unfamiliar fear of something suddenly started to emerge inside the commander. The commander immediately shouted with the support of his full energy, "You made this plan! You are the traitor behind this destruction!" His sword pointed towards the dancing figure. "All troops, prepare yourselves to face the danger!"
His voice grew louder. "Someone go! Ring the alarm bell! A demon has appeared!"
He waited for a shout, the scuffle of boots, or a voice calling back from the dark; but nothing came. Only a suffocating silence hung over that damn place.
The commander's eyes widened with shock as the floating head revolving around the headless body opened its mouth and stretched it into a wide smile with a laughter, "Ahhahahahaha!"
The sound echoed across the valley with falling thunder, and then it stared directly at the commander. "Did you remember now what you have done?"
The dancing of that headless body did not stop, nor the lighting, and beneath the blood-red sky, the commander felt a chill crawl through his entire body.
The commander shouted nervously, "What did I do? I have served this kingdom with iron and blood, securing the throne with my hands. What right do you have to ask me what I have done?"
Suddenly, his voice stopped as a strange sensation ran through his body.
Slowly lowering his gaze, he realised he was clutching something heavy, an object that seemed to grow weightier with every passing second. A thick, dark crimson fluid seeped from it, pooling in his palm before dripping down onto the earth below.
Then he felt that something heavy and yet strangely soft was on his neck. He looked down and saw the head garlands hanging around his neck. The garlands made from the severed heads of his own soldiers.
His sword slipped from his fingers first. With a 'clang' sound, the blade struck the ground. The commander stumbled backwards and collapsed onto his knees. In panic, he grabbed the garlands and tried to tear them away from his body, but no matter how hard he pulled, they seemed impossibly heavy.
For several moments, his mind completely froze.
What is happening...?
What happened here...?
His eyes slowly moved toward the headless body dancing beneath the flashing sky, shock again filled his face. In a trembling voice barely above a whisper, he muttered,
"What... is... this...?"
The floating head laughed loudly.
"Hahaha... Did you finally see everything?"
The commander's expression became blank, as if he had missed something important, and then his gaze wandered across the battlefield. Headless corpses, bodies scattered everywhere.
The blood of countless soldiers had gathered together, forming a small river that flowed towards the valley of slave-working places like a crimson stream beneath the moonlight.
The head smiled. "I asked you a question before. What do you choose—right or wrong? The commander lowered his head; with trembling lips, he answered, "I chose wrong."
The head's smile widened with a cold and sinister voice. Yes. You chose wrong, and now the consequences of that choice lie before you in disassembled forms."
The commander's trembling hands grabbed the head garland again; he desperately tried to throw it away. His fingers clawed at the severed heads as if thousands of invisible thorns were piercing his flesh. It was as though he wanted to rip away not only the garlands, but also the memories of the slaughter he had committed.
Slowly, he crawled backwards across the blood-soaked earth; his breathing was becoming ragged, and his eyes were filled with terror.
He ripped one garland from his neck and threw it towards the floating head.
"Take them back!"
Another followed.
"Take them back!"
Another.
"I never wanted this!"
His voice cracked.
"Please save me, Indira! Where are you? You said we could live together! Where are you now?"
The head tilted slightly.
"Is your Indira alive?"
Lightning struck the commander without warning, and his body instantly ceased its struggle for life. Slowly he shook his head no. The head chuckled. "Then why are you calling for her?"
The commander immediately shouted back, " No! She said we could live together. "If we killed you all, she could come back! She never lied to me! Indira came... she came..."
His crimson eyes darted towards the surrounding corpses. The internal silence he had fought so hard to maintain was shattered by a single sound: the heavy, wet drip-drip-drip of lifeblood sloughing off his armour and pooling at his boots.
As that warm, copper-scented shroud coated his skin, something fundamental, the primal emotion he had completely suppressed, his long-buried human morality, rebounded with a vengeance. It did not return as a gentle conscience but rose as a monstrous psychological horror.
The dead bodies seemed to move within his vision.
Through the scarlet smear across his eyes, the pooling blood on the ground began to churn and bubble. The rivers of gore slithering down his arms didn't feel like fluid anymore; they felt like freezing, clinging fingers. In his fractured mind, the faces of the soldiers he had just murdered began to distort, their severed heads and mangled torsos crawling forward through the dirt, dragging themselves towards him.
Every drop of blood on his body became a screaming mouth, a manifestation of his overwhelming guilt, reminding him of the bravery and honor he had permanently desecrated. Panic, absolute and feral, seized his chest. He staggered backward, swinging his bloody hand at the empty air as the hallucination closed in.
"They are coming... they're coming to eat me!" his voice broke, stripping away the fearsome commander and leaving only a terrified, helpless child trapped in a cage of his making. He clutched his head, tearing at his hair as the phantom weight of his sins threatened to bury him alive. "Indira! Come quickly! Save me!"
The floating head watched silently before speaking again. "It is your sin. You want freedom from it, don't you?" The commander nodded repeatedly. "Yes... yes..."
The head floated closer to him with a smile. "You chose the path yourself. But all sins can be cleansed."
The commander immediately looked up. Hope flickered inside his shattered eyes.
"How?"
The head smiled.
"You only need to do one thing."
The commander hurriedly replied,
"I am willing to do anything. Anything at all. Just tell me how to stop this nightmare!"
The head's grin widened unnaturally.
"A tooth for a tooth. An eye for an eye. A soul for the blood you spilt."
Its voice became cold.
"Give up your head. It is simple."
Even that lightning fell back with no sound as that sentence was spoken. For a brief moment, the commander simply stared, and suddenly anger exploded across his face. "So that's what you wanted from the beginning!"
He shouted at the floating head, "You deceived me! You scoundrel! You bitch! You lured me into this pact just for that boy and your miserable dream!"
His voice became increasingly hysterical. "You bastard! You schemer! Why did you come here? Why destroy our happiness? We never invoked you! We never angered you! So why? Why?"
The head slowly nodded.
"Tch..."
Its expression carried both amusement and disappointment. "They always said that when doom appears, wisdom vanishes first. But for you, coming back must be a good sign. This world is full of miracles."
The head floated close again with chilling malice in his eyes and spoke with a stone-grinding voice: "Nothing can be gained without losing something. Even heaven demands death as payment."
The commander clenched his fists. "But why destroy our happiness?"
The head stared at him for several long moments and spoke in a strangely bewildered tone. "You speak of happiness as though it were a fortress you built with your own hands."
Lightning flashed across the sky again and again. The battlefield was illuminating for a brief moment. "Don't you remember? Your so-called happiness was built upon the blood of those who stood in your way. You traded their lives for your position. You sacrificed their happiness for your own. When you did it, you called it justice…" The head's voice thundered across the battlefield, "…But when I do the same thing, you call it evil."
The wind suddenly intensified with heavy thunder. "So tell me..." The floating head leant closer. "Where is the judgement?"
A deafening boom echoed through the sky, the clouds twisted violently overhead. The head laughed softly.
"Justice..."
"Justice is merely an illusion people create to comfort themselves."
Its voice suddenly became a distant one. "There was never justice in this world. The grass grows from the earth. To the deer, the grass is good and the tiger is evil."
Lightning flashed.
"But ask the tiger, and the answer changes."
Another flash.
"The tiger is good. The deer is food."
The head slowly spread its arms.
"So where is the judgement?"
Its eyes locked onto the commander.
"Where is right?"
"Where is wrong?"
The thunder rumbled once more.
The head's final words echoed through the darkness.
"In the end, it depends on what you choose."
Its smile widened.
"Because every choice carries a consequence..."
"...and now you are standing before yours."
...
The commander shouted after long silence, "I choose to fight!"
The moment those words left his mouth, he grabbed his sword tightly.
A violent surge of crimson energy erupted from his body like countless bolts of lightning. The red aura expanded outward and condensed into a gigantic phantom form resembling him, far larger than before. The colossal figure towered over the battlefield, gripping a sword over fifteen metres long.
Without hesitation, it attacked. A blinding flash of lightning exploded across the battlefield. The giant phantom swung its enormous blade downward with enough force to split mountains.
At the same moment, a form rose from the headless body. It resembled Nataraja once more, yet lacked a head. One arm held a kharga radiating crimson lightning, while the other carried the chanting head that had never ceased reciting its mysterious mantras.
The battlefield trembled with their energy. The headless figure raised its arm and pointed the kharga towards the commander. Instantly, lightning descended from the heavens. The commander's giant sword, empowered by thunder and rage, collided with the kharga in midair.
Boom!
A deafening shock wave erupted outward.
The earth cracked, stones shattered nearby, and tents flew away. The surrounding soil was torn apart as if giant hands had ripped through the battlefield.
For a brief moment, both weapons remained locked against one another in the sky. Lightning continuously struck the suspended kharga, illuminating the darkness again and again.
Then the balance shattered. The kharga sliced forward, instantly splitting the gigantic crimson phantom in two. The commander's massive manifestation burst into fragments of red light as he was violently thrown backwards. He tumbled across the broken earth, smashing through rocks and mud before crashing to a halt dozens of metres away. Blood leaked from the corner of his mouth, yet his eyes burned with a refusal to surrender.
With a roar, he jumped back to his feet, and several mudras flashed across his hands. Ancient symbols ignited over his body. A powerful roar echoed across the battlefield. Spiritual energy bled from the glowing sigils, coalescing into a gigantic lion that roared into existence.
The beast charged forward with its mane crackling with lightning. Its claws tore furrows into the earth as it rushed towards the headless figure.
This time, however, the headless figure did not wait. It simply pointed the kharga towards the approaching commander.
The weapon moved by a single command, carved through the air and creating a path of absolute void and bisected that the phantom lion instantly, into countless fragments of light like stardust scattered into the night.
The same stroke continued forward, and the commander's eyes widened. Before he could react, the blade passed through him. With a clean strike, his head separated from his body.
For a moment, time itself seemed to stop; a heavy yet oppressive silence descended upon the battlefield. The commander's lifeless body remained standing for a brief second before collapsing onto the earth.
His sword slipped from his fingers with a sharp clang, the lonely echo rippling across the silent battlefield. Rain started to pour in that goddamn place. The headless figure stood motionless amidst the storm.
The water washed away the blood staining the ground, though it could never wash away the sins that had created it. The battlefield, once filled with shouting, rage, and madness, now lay silent. Only the rumble of thunder remained.
The scene itself felt like a grim monument to the endless cycle of violence. A cycle that had finally reached its conclusion. Justice, like the fading echoes of the storm, vanished into the shadows.
Only a bitter truth remained behind. Power was nothing more than a fleeting ghost. No matter how great it became, one day it would inevitably be swallowed by the darkness it once sought to command. The headless figure looked down at the fallen commander.
Then it spoke, "Time is short. Otherwise, I would surely play with you a little longer."
The wind began to blow once more. Broken banners fluttered weakly amidst the ruins. Once-proud symbols of authority now lay trampled in mud and blood. No songs would be sung of this battle. No poets would celebrate this victory. No monuments would preserve these names.
Only silence remained with the relentless dripping of rainwater upon steel.
Slowly, the chanting head floated towards the commander's severed head and circled around it three and a half times. Each rotation caused faint ripples to spread through the air.
Then the head suddenly shouted, and a strange light emerged from the commander's remains. An illusory figure slowly rose from the severed head.
The soul looked confused by seeing that floating head, as it had awakened from a dream. The floating head stared at it and asked, "Who am I?" Then it asked another question: "Who are you?"
The soul seemed unable to answer, so the floating head laughed softly. "Those are pointless questions. You asked me what real happiness is. Tell me..."
"Do you want to learn what eternal happiness truly is?"
The illusory figure stared at the head, and after a long silence, it slowly nodded.
The head smiled as he leant closer. "Good. First, remember something. You are dead."
The illusory figure trembled slightly, but the head continued.
"That body was yours once; the emotions were bound to that body once. But it was your previous life; it will no longer bind you. The fears of your next life do not belong to you either. Your ambitions, regrets, hatred, love, sorrow, and attachments have already been left behind."
"Now you are free." The soul stared silently. "No chains remain. No obligations remain. No attachments remain." The head's eyes glowed faintly. "Now I can teach you what real happiness is."
It paused.
Then turned towards another body lying nearby; it was none other than the soldier who had stood against the commander until the very end, even despite knowing death was inevitable.
The floating head nodded approvingly; a second illusory figure was pulled from the fallen soldier's body. The soul appeared before them, and the head observed him for several moments. Then, with a genuine smile, he said.
"You are worthy..."
The wind continued to howl through the ruined battlefield as the two souls stood before the mysterious head, while above them the storm clouds rolled endlessly across the dark heavens.
In between that, the floating head suddenly shouted, "Before you vanish from this world, remember this eternal truth." This body is made from the five elements. It can perish at any moment. It can be burned, torn apart, buried, or reduced to dust. But not this… Not this eternal thing that governs the body."
The wind intensified around the battlefield once more. "We are all born with it. It has always existed within us, hidden in silence. Yet we fail to recognise it, and so it remains asleep. Only those who remember can awaken its true power. I am opening the path for you two. Walk it if you dare."
Then the head began to murmur strange words towards the heavens. Suddenly, with a boom sound, a bolt of lightning descended from the sky. It struck both the illusory bodies and their severed heads.
For a brief moment, the entire area was illuminated by blinding white light. The two figures trembled violently within the lightning.
The floating head watched silently with a strange laugh.
"Hunh..."
It shook slightly, "So this so-called eternal truth is merely another excuse humans tell themselves. Everything comes from dust and everything returns to dust. Even souls can be consumed by thunder."
Its voice rose, "Go then. Run. Run while the path remains open." The wind howled with clouds twisting power, "Go. Run. I am opening the path for all of you."
Its voice became louder, frantic and yet more excited.
"Go run!"
"Go run!"
"Open the path..."
Its laughter mixed with its words.
"Opennn..."
Before the final sound faded, the headless body moved, with a flash of lightning, it leapt down from the rock. It landed upon the ground and gathered the severed heads from the garlands around it.
One after another. First, he gathered those loosened falling heads and caught a descending lightning bolt with his bare hand. Using that lightning as a needle and cord, the figure began sewing those heads together.
The heads were connected one after another until they formed something and that figure carefully arranged them around the large stone, on which he was always sitting. Then it dragged the five corresponding bodies behind the heads. Lightning threads stitched flesh to flesh, body to body. bone to bone.
Once the bodies were arranged, it continued, another head was placed before each pair of legs, two severed hands were connected beside every head. The arrangement resembled some ancient ritual geometry whose meaning had long been forgotten. The remaining corpses, those intended as additional oblations, were carefully laid across the rock in precise positions.
That headless figure was about to sit down over there, but a cracked old woman's voice echoed throughout the entire area, "Wait."
The voice reverberated unnaturally. As if from the surrounding mountains, it seemed to repeat it again and again: "Stop it."
The headless figure turned and saw near the stone a tiny green sprout had appeared from nowhere. Two small eyes suddenly opened upon its two growing leaves. The strange sprout spoke: "Your work ends here. You do not need to continue the sacrifice."
The leaves swayed gently despite the violent wind. "Go there. Delay it. I will take care of the rest."
The headless figure remained silent. But after several moments, it turned away and moved some distance from the ritual site.
The sprout suddenly began to change; its stem thickened, branches emerged, and on it wrinkled skin formed. Within moments, the sprout transformed into an old woman. Her white hair fluttered in the storm. Suddenly she began chanting.
The sound spread in every direction. As her chant continued, seven more sprouts emerged around the stone.
Each possessed a different colour. The seven sprouts rapidly grew and transformed. Together with the old woman, they formed eight positions around the ritual site. Then each one began chanting a different sound. The atmosphere changed instantly as the lightning threads connecting the bodies began vibrating.
The stone itself trembled. Even the surrounding air seemed to resonate with the chanting. The old woman raised her hands towards the sky. Her voice carried a solemn reverence. "Oh Great One… I, a small and insignificant being, call upon you. I call upon that so-called great power. Please accept this offering and remove this burden from us."
For a brief moment, everything became still, but suddenly, like the heavens answered with calamity. Red lightning descended from the sky with the series of 'Boom!' sounds. The earth shook violently as the red lightning struck the ritual formation directly. The stone cracked. The bodies ignited. The entire area became a sea of red light.
The storm roared; the mountains trembled. But then suddenly the lightning vanished, the chanting stopped and the storm calmed.
When the light finally faded, nothing remained of the old woman; the sprouts, bodies, and heads were gone. Only black scorch marks remained upon the ground. Those marks formed a strange and cursed geometry.
An enormous pattern was etched into the earth itself, and in its centre stood the rock which was starting to melt from the immense lightning. The stone flowed like hardened wax.
The entire place looked like the aftermath of a forgotten divine punishment. Everything fell silent. Neither wind nor thunder nor movement from anywhere was seen or heard.
Then, from somewhere beyond the visible world, a voice began to echo like the heartbeat of the earth itself as its sound spread across the valley, the mountains, and the darkness.
"Welcome..."
The sound paused for a moment, as if checking its own words, before the voice resumed, deeper this time: "Welcome to the journey of..."
"The land of curses."
"The land of eternity."
"The land of equality."
"The land of love and hatred."
"The land of virtue and sin."
"The land of birth and death."
"The land of anger and calmness..."
To be continued…
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