Aarav's first thought when he woke up was that the world felt… heavier.
Not like a blanket on his chest.
More like the air itself had gained weight.
He opened his eyes slowly.
Thin lines of sunlight slipped in through the cracks of the wooden window. Dust floated in those lines like tiny stars. He watched them for a moment, blinking lazily.
Then he felt it.
A soft warmth.
Right in the center of his chest.
He placed his palm there.
For a second, it felt like something inside him glowed back.
Aarav rubbed his eyes.
"Must be a weird dream," he muttered.
But the warmth did not go away.
🌄 A Different Kind of Morning
He sat up and listened.
Usually, mornings in Dharmapura began with sound:
the clink of pots,
mothers calling their children,
goats bleating,
birds arguing in the trees,
the river whispering in the distance.
Today…
It was quieter.
Not completely silent, but… thinner somehow.
Like someone had taken a big, deep breath and not let it out yet.
Aarav frowned and swung his legs off the cot.
His mother, Meera, was already awake in the next room. He could hear the soft metal sound of bangles sliding on her wrist as she worked.
"Aarav!" she called. "Wake up, lazy moon. The sun has finished half its walk."
"I'm up!" he shouted back, though he still felt half in a dream.
He splashed water on his face from the clay pot near the door. The water was colder than usual. It startled him awake.
His fingers brushed his chest again.
Still warm.
He lifted the thin fabric of his kurta to look.
Nothing there.
No mark.
No burn.
No scar.
"Strange," he whispered.
🪔 Mother's Simple Dharma
In the main room, his mother was lighting a small oil lamp in front of a faded picture on the wall: a form of Vishnu resting on a cosmic serpent, the world-lotus rising from his navel.
Aarav watched the little flame flicker.
"Ma," he said, still thinking about the word that had appeared in his dream without a voice.
"What is it, beta?" Meera asked, not turning yet.
"What is… Dharma?"
Meera paused, matchstick still in her fingers.
"That's a big question for someone who still forgets to wash his plate," she teased.
Aarav folded his arms. "I'm serious."
She smiled and finally turned, her eyes kind and a little tired.
"Dharma," she said slowly, "is… doing what is right for who you are, where you are."
"That sounds like something old people say when they don't want to explain," Aarav grumbled.
Meera laughed softly.
"Fine. Look."
She pointed out the door.
"The sun's dharma is to shine. If it stops shining, what happens?"
"It would be dark," Aarav said.
"And cold. Plants would die. We would freeze. The world would fall sick."
She picked up a metal cup.
"This cup's dharma is to hold water. If I keep punching holes in it, is it doing its dharma?"
"No. It's useless," Aarav said.
"And your dharma?" She tapped him gently on the forehead. "For now: to learn, to help, to be honest, to not make your mother old before her time."
"That's many dharmas," Aarav complained.
She raised an eyebrow. "Life is many things at once."
He hesitated.
"And… Adharma?"
Meera's smile faded a little.
"Adharma is when you know what is right… and walk the other way anyway."
"Like lying?"
"Yes."
"Like stealing?"
"Yes."
"Like when that rich merchant cheated the farmers last year?" Aarav said, remembering the anger in the village.
Meera's jaw tightened.
"Yes. That was Adharma too."
She put the lit lamp gently in front of the picture.
"When you act with Dharma, you help keep the world in balance, even in small ways. When you act with Adharma, you add to the mess."
She turned to him, softer now.
"Why are you asking this so early in the morning?"
Aarav opened his mouth.
He wanted to say:
Because something inside me feels strange.
Because I saw light and darkness in my dream, and both felt like me.
Instead, he said:
"I… I just heard the word in a story last night."
Meera looked at him for a moment, as if wondering whether to ask more. Then she nodded.
"Finish your food and go check the river level, hmm? The fields won't water themselves."
Aarav sighed.
"Yes, Ma."
🌾 The River and the Cracks
A little later, he walked toward the river with a clay pot in hand.
Dust rose around his ankles as he walked down the path between houses. Dharmapura was waking up:
someone shouting at a stubborn cow,
someone else laughing at a shared joke,
a baby crying;
the smell of frying flatbread and onions floating in the air.
It should have felt normal.
But the warmth in his chest stayed.
And something about the sky felt… wrong.
It was blue.
But pale, tired.
Like an old cloth that had been washed too many times.
As he neared the riverbank, he slowed down.
The river of Dharmapura had always been the village's pride. In stories, elders said it was blessed by ancient rishis, that it would never truly dry.
But now, as Aarav stepped up to the edge, his heart sank.
The waterline had dropped again.
Exposed stones that used to sleep underwater now lay bare in the morning light.
He knelt and touched the mud.
Dry.
Cracked in a spiderweb pattern.
"Again…" he whispered.
He had seen it in bits and pieces over the last few seasons. The elders would shake their heads and say, "Rains are weaker now," or "Times are changing."
But this time, something felt different.
The warmth in his chest pulsed softly.
As he leaned down to fill his pot, he froze.
For just a second, his reflection in the water…
wasn't his.
🌊 The Strange Reflection
Aarav stared into the river.
At first, he saw himself:
brown skin, messy hair, sleep-heavy eyes, a boy who didn't feel special at all.
Then the image rippled.
His face stayed the same—
but his eyes…
His eyes in the reflection glowed faintly.
Not fully golden.
Not fully dark.
A deep, strange mix of both.
His heart lurched.
He blinked.
The glow vanished.
Now it was just plain old Aarav again.
He sat back hard onto the bank.
"What was that?" he whispered. "Am I… dreaming?"
The air around him felt suddenly colder.
The warmth in his chest flared once, like a warning.
The surface of the water darkened, the way it does when a cloud passes over the sun.
But there were no clouds.
The dark patch deepened.
It grew, spreading under the water like a stain.
Aarav's breath hitched.
The stain rose.
Not as liquid.
As shadow.
🌫️ The Whisper from the Water
The shadow underneath the surface twisted into a shape.
Long.
Thin.
Unclear.
Not a fish.
Not a branch.
Not anything he knew.
It felt more like… a hole in the water, filled with moving darkness.
A faint sound rose from it.
Not a voice at first.
More like a wind through a narrow tunnel far away.
Then it changed.
It shaped itself into a word.
Into his name.
"Aarav…"
He jerked back so fast his heel slipped on the loose soil.
He barely managed to steady himself.
The voice came again, a little clearer.
Not loud.
Not kind.
Not cruel.
Just… deep.
"Aarav Devanshi…"
His heart pounded in his ears.
"How do you know my name?" he whispered.
No answer.
The shadow under the water only trembled.
He knew he should run.
He knew he should shout for the elders.
But something held him there.
The warmth in his chest tingled, almost hot now.
He leaned forward a little more, curiosity fighting with fear.
The shadow stretched and rose higher, pressing against the underside of the river's surface like someone pushing up from below a thin sheet of glass.
For a heartbeat,
he saw eyes in it.
Not shaped like human eyes.
More like two red swirls in the darkness.
His breath faltered.
The shadow moved.
It started to reach up—
as if it could push through the water
and touch him.
Aarav finally choked out a sound.
"Stop—!"
🕉️ The Voice of Light
Before the shadow could break the surface,
another sound sliced through the air.
A single word.
Calm, but strong.
"Enough."
The shadow flinched.
The river shivered.
The dark patch shrank on itself like burned cloth.
Aarav turned.
An old man stood a short distance away on the path, leaning on a wooden staff.
He wore plain, travel-worn clothes.
His beard was white, long but neatly kept.
His hair was tied back.
His eyes… his eyes held something that made Aarav's breath steady without knowing why.
They were gentle.
But behind that gentleness was something vast, like a night sky full of unseen stars.
The man stepped closer, the ground seeming to welcome his feet.
He lifted his staff slightly.
The river calmed.
The last trace of the black stain faded into normal water.
Aarav stared at him.
"W-who are you?" he asked.
The man studied him for a moment, gaze dropping to Aarav's chest as if he could see something glowing there.
At last, he spoke.
"My name is Rishi Vardaan," he said.
His voice matched his eyes—calm, deep, like water that had seen many storms and survived them all.
"I have come," he added softly, "because something woke inside you last night… and Adharma has already noticed."
Aarav felt the world tilt a little.
"Adharma?" he repeated. "Like… doing bad things?"
Vardaan shook his head.
"Not only that. Adharma is when beings turn so far away from their true nature that they tear holes in the world itself."
He pointed to the river where the shadow had been.
"That was a small taste of it."
Aarav's chest suddenly felt very hot.
He winced and pressed his hand to it.
Vardaan watched carefully.
"You feel it, don't you?" the sage asked.
"The… warmth?" Aarav said.
"Not just warmth," Vardaan murmured. "A flame. One part born of Dharma, one part born of Adharma. Mixed in the same soul. A very rare, very dangerous gift."
Aarav's voice came out small.
"Gift? It doesn't feel like a gift. It feels… scary."
Vardaan nodded.
"Most great things are scary at first."
He sat down easily on a nearby rock, as if he had all the time in the world.
"Come, sit."
Aarav hesitated, then sat a short distance away, still gripping the clay pot he hadn't filled.
The river flowed weakly beside them.
"Listen to me, Aarav Devanshi," Vardaan said gently. "The world you know is changing. Dharma grows thin. Adharma grows bold. You have already seen signs: the shrinking river, the strange sky, the shadow in the water."
Aarav swallowed.
"Yes."
"Those who cling only to what they can touch will say it is just 'weather,' just 'bad times.' But you… you have been chosen to see deeper than that."
"Chosen by who?" Aarav asked.
Vardaan looked up at the pale sky, then back at him.
"By the same Eternal Truth that existed before gods, before demons, before time."
He smiled slightly. "By Sanatan itself."
Aarav felt both very small and very seen at the same time.
"Why me?" he whispered.
The sage's eyes were kind… and sad.
"Because, child… inside you, Dharma and Adharma are not just forces outside. They are awake as living fire."
He tapped his own chest in the exact place Aarav felt the heat.
"You," Vardaan said softly, "are to become the battlefield where the fate of this age will be decided."
Aarav's mouth went dry.
"Battlefield…?" he repeated.
Vardaan nodded.
"And maybe… its protector."
The river whispered beside them, weak but still moving.
The sky watched, pale and waiting.
Inside Aarav's chest,
the strange flame pulsed once,
as if saying:
"Yes. I am here."
He didn't know it yet.
But this quiet morning,
beside a tired river and an old sage,
was the first step on a path
that would lead him
far beyond Dharmapura,
into realms of gods, demons, rishis, titans,
and into the deepest part of his own soul
where Dharma and Adharma would meet face to face.
And the world, without knowing it,
held its breath.
✦ END OF CHAPTER 2 ✦