The sun had barely risen by the time Shiv limped his way back to the Varma Clan estate. Dawn bathed the stone walls in golden light, but it felt hollow. Empty.
He trudged across the grounds, clothes torn, hair wild, and dried blood staining his cheeks.
"Some cemetery of dragons," he thought bitterly. "More like a burial ground for fools."
No one noticed his return — or perhaps no one cared. The family had long stopped seeing him as one of their own.
Still, despite the dull ache in his body, something gnawed at him. A feeling he couldn't shake.
So he went straight to the back courtyard where the junior disciples trained. The place where he had tasted humiliation a thousand times.
The training dummy stood tall, the same one that had resisted his every strike for years — a cruel symbol of his useless efforts.
"Let's just get it over with," he muttered, cracking his knuckles. "Even if I waste another day, at least I'll bleed for it."
He took a stance — Iron Tiger Form, Basic Level 1. It had always felt stiff to him, like forcing a broken machine to move.
He launched a punch toward the dummy's chest.
THUD!
The entire dummy shuddered.
Shiv froze.
"That… felt different."
He adjusted his footing and threw another punch, this time adding a low spin.
THWACK!
The wooden post cracked — a long, splintering fracture running down its center.
"…What?" Shiv whispered, his eyes wide.
His heart pounded. He dropped into a low stance and began flowing through the basic forms: Iron Tiger, Coiled Viper, Palm of the Rising Sun — movements that once caused his muscles to seize and joints to lock — now flowed like water.
Each motion was crisp, powerful, fluid.
No resistance. No pain. No stiffness. Nothing holding him back.
"I can… move." He stood there, stunned. "I can finally feel the techniques."
His breathing slowed, and he instinctively sat cross-legged on the courtyard stone, shutting his eyes. The wind rustled through the trees, and the morning sounds of training faded into silence.
"Let me try to gather energy…"
In his family, they called it Prāṇa — the life-force that martial artists learned to sense and manipulate.
He focused inward.
A rush of warmth surged from his navel to his chest. The Prāṇa flowed easily, like a river unclogged.
But then… something else stirred.
Another pulse — deeper, colder, and older. A strange current slithered beneath the Prāṇa, like a coiled serpent in black waters.
His breath caught.
"What… is this?" he muttered. "This isn't Prāṇa…"
It was denser, heavier — a dark, ancient presence. It didn't flow, it waited. It didn't hum — it growled.
As he reached toward it with his mind, a sudden jolt hit his spine.
"AGH!"
His body arched backward as a thread of the dark energy surged through him. It wasn't like fire — it was like gravity had thickened inside his veins. His bones felt like iron rods. His senses sharpened — for one terrifying moment, he heard the heartbeat of every person in the estate around him.
A stone nearby cracked under the pressure radiating from his body.
He opened his eyes with a gasp, sweat pouring down his face.
"I… only touched a sliver of it…" he whispered.
He turned to the training dummy again, now barely standing.
With a hesitant breath, he drew on that dark force once more — just a thread.
And punched.
CRACK!
The top of the wooden post exploded into fragments, sailing through the air.
Shiv staggered back, blinking.
"That wasn't just strength… that was something else. That energy… it's not Prāṇa. It's…"
He clutched his chest. The two energies swirled inside him like twin dragons circling a storm.
"One light… one shadow."
"Whatever that pond was," he said, voice shaking, "it didn't trick me."
"It changed me."
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