Ashes of Dharma

The path didn't begin with steps.

It began with stillness.

Aarav sat beneath the moon, breath slow, back straight. The whisper in his spine had become a current, subtle but constant, like a river beneath stone.

Then—it shifted.

His awareness snapped.

One moment he was under the stars. The next, he stood in a void of endless black. No ground. No sound. Only him—and something in front of him.

A mirror. But there was no glass.

Only air.

Only reflection without form.

It didn't show his body. It didn't show his face.

It showed... versions.

Aarav, the warrior. Aarav, the god. Aarav, broken. Aarav, begging. Aarav, cruel. Aarav, numb.

Thousands of possible hims, layered in the emptiness.

One stepped forward.

A version of him who had given up after the accident in the modern world. Who never found the path. Who became small, bitter, violent. This Aarav reached out with one shaking hand.

"Choose me," he whispered. "I'm safe. I already lost everything. Nothing else can hurt us."

Aarav didn't speak.

He simply breathed.

The real breath—not shallow. Not fearful. The breath that came from root to skull, spine aligned, still as death and alive as flame.

The shadow-Aarav flinched. Melted. Disappeared.

And the first Gate opened.

A single line of blue light split the void.

A voice whispered, not in sound, but in marrow:

"The first gate is not escaped. It is faced."