The Judgment Field was no longer of the world.
The sigils beneath Devavrata's feet bloomed into an ocean of light, searing away the dust, the wind, the very sky. All sound fled. The world narrowed into silence so deep it pressed against his ribs like a second heartbeat.
Devavrata took a step.
The world shifted.
The Circle of Judgment closed around him like the eye of an ancient god—wide, pitiless, eternal.
A reflection appeared before him. Then another. And another. Representing the past, the present and the future.
Three figures emerged from the light—each one himself, yet not.
The first was Devavrata the Boy, wrapped in silk and dreams, eyes full of the Ganga and the sky, a crownless prince untouched by war.
The second was Devavrata the Oath-Taker, the moment of his vow seared into his chest like fire—shoulders squared, lips bloodless, the chains of destiny freshly clasped around his soul.
The third… was Devavrata the Butcher, older, worn, eyes dark as storm-soaked stone, a phantom from a future not yet lived, his armor stained, his blade wet.
They stood in a triangle around him.
The circle throbbed with a living mantra.
Then they spoke—each with his voice. Each with his truth.
The Boy stepped forward.
His voice was young, but the words were older than stone.
"What is more dangerous—breaking the law to do what is right…
Or upholding the law even when it protects the wicked?"
Devavrata's breath caught—but not in fear. In thought.
He looked not at the boy, but beyond him—
To battles yet unfought.
To kings yet uncrowned.
To choices that would scar history.
At last, he spoke:
"Law without conscience becomes tyranny.
But defiance without purpose births chaos.
Dharma is not in law nor rebellion alone—
It is in knowing which protects the innocent."
The circle pulsed, deep and golden.
"Then what will you do…
When law and justice pull in opposite directions?"
Devavrata's eyes did not flicker.
"I will walk between them—
Even if I walk alone."
Light broke.
The Boy dissolved—smiling.
The circle accepted it. The boy vanished in light.
The Oath-Taker followed.
Wreathed in the broken sigils of long-dead kings.
His voice echoed like iron dragged through dust.
"You would bind yourself to a throne.
But what if that throne one day serves adharma?
Will you raise your blade for the people—
Or bow to the crown that betrays them?"
Devavrata's gaze did not waver.
He saw the city not in marble and banners—
But in hungry mouths, tired hands, and hope clinging like ash.
"I will speak when the court falls silent.
Stand when others kneel.
Remind the crown of its duty—until it remembers.
And if it forgets…
Then I will endure, so its sins do not fall upon the innocent."
A silence bloomed—like a wound unspoken.
The Oath-Taker dissolved.
The circle brightened. The Oath-Taker dissolved.
Now came the Butcher.
The future—the truth he feared—loomed before him.
"When the time comes, you will raise your sword not just against enemies, but against your own kin and children of the realm.
You will become dharma's enemy, bound by vows that chain your will.
Your silence will allow kings to fall and tyrants to rise.
You will fight a war where no side is truly just,
and yet you will not waver, even as your heart breaks.
Will you still claim the right to judge?"
Devavrata's breath hitched. The weight of power both called to him and terrified him—a flame that could warm or consume.
Even he desired to be loved, to be seen beyond the armor of duty and sacrifice.
The ground cracked beneath his knees as he bowed his head.
He whispered, voice heavy but steady:
"If I must carry hatred—
if I must forsake love, and bind myself in chains of oath and silence,
to keep the fragile peace and uphold the throne,
then I will not flinch.
I will bear what must be borne."
The Butcher's eyes softened, a grim sorrow etched deep:
"Then prepare to carry a burden no soul can forgive."
He raised his hand.
The Bhargavastra's mantra collapsed inward. The circle spun with impossible force, and from the light descended a brand—no iron, no flame, just pure knowing. It hovered over Devavrata's chest like the final word of a god.
It sank into his Chest.
The brand glowed once—then vanished beneath his skin.
A mark no eye could see, but which truth itself would always recognize.
He screamed.
But not in pain.
In recognition.
He saw everything.
Not in words. Not in visions. In essence.
The shape of battles yet unborn. The screams of brothers split by duty. Thrones drowned in silence. Betrayals braided into garlands of honor. Oaths twisted until they bled. The faces of those he would love—and still lift his sword against.
And in one unbearable breath, the image of himself:
Alone. Revered. Cursed. Unbroken. Unhealed.
Then—
Gone.
Not dimmed.
Erased.
The moment passed like lightning cleaving the sky—brilliant, absolute, and then only smoke. The knowledge ripped through him, branded him…
and was taken.
The Bhargavastra did not allow him to carry the future. Not truly.
For even with his cultivation at Mid Stage Soul transformation, the price of knowing fate is to become its prisoner.
And Devavrata was not meant to be caged.
He staggered, breath ragged, heart thundering as though he had just crossed death's own border. Yet his mind held nothing. No image. No detail. Only an ache, deep in his bones, as if his soul had witnessed something and chosen—for its own survival—not to remember.
Parashurama stood watching, silent.
"It showed you the truth," he said at last. "Then it spared you from it."
Devavrata straightened slowly.
"Why?"
Parashurama's gaze turned distant.
"Because the truth is not always to be carried. Sometimes, it is only to be endured.
And sometimes… forgotten just enough to walk forward."
Devavrata touched his chest where the unseen brand pulsed faintly beneath the skin.
He did not know what he had seen. But he knew he had been changed.
And from that day on, whenever he stood upon a battlefield, a strange stillness would descend upon him for just an instant—like the breath before prophecy.
Though he remembered nothing...
His soul never forgot.
Devavrata stood in stillness. The sigil on his chest burned faintly beneath his robes.
"What happens… When I use it?"
Parashurama's expression turned grave.
"The Bhargavastra never strikes cleanly. It never kills only your enemy."
"Then what does it do?"
"It balances. Always."
He continued, voice echoing like the toll of an ancient bell:
"If you strike a king with it, it may break the chains of a thousand servants… but it will also shatter a hundred innocent dreams. Because it unmakes systems, not men."
Devavrata's breath caught.
Parashurama looked up at the dulling sky.
"And every time it is used… a mark is left not on the battlefield, but on the wielder. A debt that karma itself counts."
"What kind of debt?"
Parashurama met his gaze.
"Your victories will always come with grief. Not immediate. Not obvious. But somewhere in the world—a child will be born without a father. A river will dry. A kingdom will fall to ruin. Balance, Devavrata. The price of judgment is never neat."
A long silence stretched between them.
Then Devavrata finally said:
"And if I never use it?"
Parashurama smiled, but there was no mirth in it.
"Then you will have learned the last lesson of power: that it is not a gift, but a judgment you carry forever."
As the last echo of judgment faded and the sigil dimmed to a ghostlight on his chest, Devavrata slowly rose. The earth beneath him felt different—still cracked from the truths unearthed, yet somehow steadier beneath his feet.
Parashurama watched him in silence as Devavrata placed his hand over the faint, ember-like seal of the Bhargavastra.
A whisper passed from soul to skin.
Then Devavrata drew a breath—not as a warrior, not as a prince, but as the bearer of something no one else would ever understand. He closed his eyes and summoned his inner will, weaving threads of his cultivation, dharma, and restraint into a sacred knot within his spirit.
He sealed it.
Not with force, but with purpose.
Not with pride, but with fear.
The Bhargavastra sank into the depths of his soul, wrapped in a cocoon of self-forged oaths—buried in the place where his sacrifices bled into silence. There, it would slumber. Not forgotten, not forgiven.
Awaiting the hour when all light falters.
Parashurama stepped beside him, voice low as thunder beyond the mountains.
"That is not a weapon for war, boy. It is a reckoning. Call upon it only when justice itself is drowning… and there is no one left to breathe for it."
Devavrata nodded once, solemn.
"Then let it sleep. Until the world can no longer bear its own lies."