The Shivnadi is free. Kalnemi is gone. Krodha is redeemed. And still, the sky cracks. Because Tamoraksha—the Fourth Realm—no longer whispers. It calls. A final breach opens where no seal was placed. Not on Earth. Not in Paatal Lok. But between the realms, in the spaces between names. The true flood begins—not of water, but of unmeaning.
The night was supposed to be still.
But the stars… bent.
Not shimmered.
Not twinkled.
Bent.
As though the heavens themselves were no longer painted on sky—
but scribbled on glass
about to shatter.
Makardvach stood atop the Mortal Gate.
His armor was cracked.
His skin still burned from Krodha’s strike.
But his breath—
was steady.
He looked up.
And saw the crack form.
Not in the air.
In the boundary between Earth and everywhere else.
A rip like a vertical river.
No color.
No sound.
Just absence.
Rishabh climbed to his side.
“That is not a door.”
Makardvach nodded.
“It’s a wound.”
Megha joined them, scrolls trembling in her arms.
“There was no myth for this. No prophecy.”
Akshay’s voice crackled through the comms.
“That’s because this isn’t an arrival.
It’s a return.”
The rip widened.
Not outward.
Downward.
Into Delhi.
Into Paatal Lok.
Into Heaven itself.
And from it—
A sound began.
Not a roar.
Not a whisper.
A concept.
So ancient, it never needed to speak.
Makardvach stepped forward.
The crack hummed in his bones.
The Shivnadi inside him responded.
But not in fear.
In recognition.
He looked at the others.
“If this is a wound,” he said softly,
“then someone needs to stitch it shut from inside.”
Megha stepped back.
“No. You can’t. Not again.”
Rishabh whispered, “If you enter this… you may not come back.”
Makardvach didn’t smile.
He simply turned.
Wind brushed his cheek.
And Vānaprakāśa lit once more—
not to fight,
but to guide.
He stepped through the crack.
And vanished.
It was not darkness.
It was beyond darkness.
Tamoraksha did not feel cold.
It did not echo.
Because echo required walls.
And this place had none.
Makardvach floated.
But not like flight.
Like falling in every direction.
Shapes formed around him.
Not objects.
Memories unanchored.
A burning schoolyard.
A river that screamed names backward.
A younger Makardvach holding a map that kept erasing his home.
These were not hallucinations.
They were tests.
Tamoraksha was watching.
And then it spoke.
Not in voice.
In rearranged instinct.
A thought that wasn’t his own, stitched into his brain:
“You are not needed.
You are not wanted.
You are not remembered.”
Makardvach clenched his fists.
“I am all of those things.
Because I chose to be.”
A shape appeared ahead.
Tall.
Broad-shouldered.
Wearing red and gold.
Him.
But not him.
Its face was smoother.
Its eyes were blank.
It held Vānaprakāśa too—but its version glowed black, with a pulse that took instead of gave.
The Void-Double spoke aloud.
“I am the version of you who never cried for help.
Who never needed others.
Who never failed.”
Makardvach narrowed his eyes.
“Then you’re not me.
You’re a fiction.”
The double raised its weapon.
“I am what Tamoraksha wants to make real.”
They clashed.
Lightning met silence.
Every strike Makardvach made was countered—
not faster,
but emptier.
The double had no fear to slow it.
No love to protect.
No memory to carry.
Makardvach’s blows were slowed by weight.
The double’s were sharpened by nothing.
And yet—
Every time Makardvach stumbled…
He saw something.
Behind the double.
Floating in the un-space.
Faces.
Megha.
Rishabh.
Akshay.
Adira.
Even Lanka.
Not present.
But remembered.
And with each blow, that memory pulsed brighter.
He parried a strike.
Let the weight of his pain fuel him.
Let the name Makardvach Rathore ring inside him like a temple bell.
And said—
“You’re not what I could’ve been.
You’re what I overcame.”
And then he struck—
Not with the storm-end.
But the wind-end.
The one powered by legacy.
It shattered the double’s chest.
Revealing—
Not organs.
But a hole.
A tear in reality, shaped like a man who never belonged.
The double dissolved.
And Tamoraksha paused.
Not in defeat.
In curiosity.
Makardvach stood in the stillness.
And whispered:
“I am not your version of me.
I am mine.”
There were no more shapes.
No illusions.
No watchers.
Just the altar.
It floated at the center of what could be called nothing—
not because it lacked substance,
but because it had too much to be seen at once.
Makardvach approached slowly.
Each step felt like walking across every moment he’d ever lived.
As if time were being woven beneath him.
And then—
He saw it.
A thread.
Black.
Endless.
And perfectly still.
The Kala Sutra.
It was not beautiful.
It was not frightening.
It was… inevitable.
He reached out.
Did not touch.
Just hovered above it.
And it pulsed—once.
Not light.
Not heat.
Memory.
A whisper curled through Tamoraksha like smoke with direction.
“He left it for you.”
Makardvach’s jaw tightened.
“Hanuman.”
And then the altar remembered.
He saw—
Hanuman kneeling here.
Alone.
Trembling.
Holding the thread in one massive hand.
And not tying it.
But leaving it.
Whispering:
“They must choose their ending themselves.
No god may bind them forever.”
Makardvach stepped back.
The thread shimmered.
Waiting.
Not asking.
Not commanding.
Just offering.
Megha’s voice crackled across the comm in his ear—despite Tamoraksha.
“Mak… something’s happening topside.
The realms are bleeding again.
Time’s skipping like a scratched CD.
If we don’t do something soon—”
Makardvach stared down.
And whispered:
“If I tie it… the realms could heal.
But they’ll be fixed.
No more choice.
No more chaos.
Just… order.”
“If I leave it… they’ll suffer.
But they’ll be free.”
He reached out.
Touched the thread.
It felt like holding wind soaked in ink.
He closed his eyes.
And listened.
To the stories.
All of them.
Not legends.
Not epics.
The quiet ones.
A mother humming in traffic.
A widow lighting incense.
A child lying about their math test.
A father confessing he was scared.
Not perfect.
Not pure.
But alive.
He pulled back.
Smiled.
And said:
“Hanuman was right.
Stories should breathe.
Not be tied.”
He bowed.
Left the thread untied.
And Tamoraksha…
smiled.
Or something like it.
And whispered back:
“Then you are no longer just a protector.
You are the one who remembered
when even the gods forgot.”
Tamoraksha pulsed.
But it did not rage.
It sighed.
Not as storm, but as surrender.
Makardvach stood on a platform of idea-stone, watching the crack he entered widen again.
Only this time—
It invited.
From behind him, the river came.
Not water.
The Shivnadi.
Reawakened.
Recolored.
Rewritten.
It flowed toward him, shaped by all he had seen.
All he had become.
Not the flood it once was.
Not the curse.
Now?
It was bridge.
He stepped into it.
Felt no pull.
Only direction.
Above, on Earth—
The skies broke gold.
The breach pulsed open once more over Delhi.
And from it:
A figure emerged.
Not on wings.
Not with roar.
But with reminder.
Makardvach fell gently onto the Mortal Gate.
The river flowed with him—
And then upward.
Circling the sky like a ribbon of collective memory.
People stopped.
Looked up.
Not in fear.
In awe.
And one by one—
They began to chant.
Not “Monkey Man.”
Not “Protector.”
“Vanara Man.”
“Vanara Man.”
“Vanara Man.”
Not a title.
A bond.
Megha reached him first.
Eyes wet.
“You made it back.”
He nodded. “I didn’t come alone.”
Rishabh smiled, lifting his staff.
“The river came too.”
Akshay raised a device. “It’s… it’s everywhere. It’s flowing through time. Healing timelines.”
Adira landed beside them in a streak of silver light.
“Krodha’s vanished. His fire burns gardens now. Not cities.”
Makardvach turned.
Looked up at the last thread of the Shivnadi still floating in the breach.
It shimmered.
Then unraveled—
and dissolved into the clouds.
Not lost.
Set free.
And for the first time since the beginning—
All three realms breathed in sync.
Makardvach sat beneath the newly whole arch of the Mortal Gate.
No lightning.
No roar.
Just wind—real wind—stirring the dust where the Shivnadi had last touched Earth.
His armor was cracked.
His shoulders slumped.
But he felt something he hadn’t since that first day in the cave.
Not strength.
Not certainty.
Stillness.
He closed his eyes.
Listened.
To nothing.
To everything.
And in that quiet—
A shadow formed before him.
Not cast by light.
But by memory.
Bare feet.
Broad shoulders.
Eyes deep with time.
No crown.
No wings.
No divine flare.
Just Hanuman.
Not as a warrior.
But as a teacher.
Makardvach didn’t bow.
Didn’t rise.
Just smiled.
“You waited.”
Hanuman smiled back.
“No. I watched. You chose.”
They sat in silence.
And then the Vanara god looked toward the sky, now whole, now calm.
“You left the thread untied,” Hanuman said softly.
Makardvach nodded. “If they’re to survive, they need to do it freely.”
Hanuman smiled wider.
“You’ve surpassed me.”
Makardvach chuckled. “I remembered you. That’s all.”
Hanuman leaned closer.
“No, child. You remembered all of them. Even those we tried to forget.”
The god stood.
His form already fading—not dying, not vanishing,
just returning to story.
One last word passed from lips to air to soul:
“Not king.
Not god.
Not avatar.
Guardian.”
And with that—
Hanuman was gone.
But not lost.
Makardvach stood beneath the gate.
The world behind him.
The Fourth Realm sealed.
The river now breath.
The story—
still being told.
