The training hall had been completely reconfigured. Once a dusty Dominion test space, it now carried the quiet gravity of transformation. Reinforced metal plates lined the floor and walls. Overhead, repurposed scanners buzzed with soft blue light, including the centerpiece: a spherical resonance meter designed to measure each individual's Noctirum sync ratio in real time. Silver tendrils extended from the orb, mapping aura vibrations in the space around them.
As they stepped in, the device activated with a pulse. "Sync level check initiated," Mansi's voice rang from the control panel above. "Stand still." A gentle scan passed over the group.
"Naina: 88.2%. Aanchal: 87.9%. Aman: 84.6%. Dikshant: 83.1%..." She paused.
"Shivam… undefined or as it shows — can't be measured." Shivam raised an eyebrow. "Guess I broke it." Laughter rippled through the others.
Agastya's voice cut through. "That's not a compliment, Shivam. It's a responsibility." He stepped into the light. "Your aura is both your weapon and their anchor. You'll need to learn how to wield both."
The moment they began the drills, the pressure returned. Agastya pointed to the center of the mat. "Start with natural response. No forced activation. Let it come through motion. Let it answer you."
It took a few hesitant steps, a few instinctual actions, but the power began to stir. Not with explosions or lightning — but with intention. The kind that came from understanding one's breath and motion and drive. Aanchal and Naina were the first to step forward. Their instincts were sharper, more fluid.
Aanchal narrowed her gaze and took a breath. Her muscles tensed and then — blur. Her figure flickered forward, feet skimming across the ground, sword unsheathed in one seamless motion. She reached a dummy target and struck through it with clean, controlled precision. Her motion slowed only after she passed it — her eyes wide but focused.
"I just... saw where I needed to go," she whispered. "And I was already there."
Behind her, Naina remained perfectly still. Her hand lifted. Nothing in her posture changed, but the air shimmered. A bow — radiant and taut — took shape in her grip. She drew an invisible string, breathing calmly. An arrow formed from thought.
She Shot. The arrow streaked through the air with no arc, no flutter. It struck the heart of the target, and a soft echo of impact sang through the room.
Agastya nodded once. "Discipline. You're guiding the power, not chasing it. Very good." Then came Aman and Dikshant.
Aman cracked his knuckles and walked to his mark. "Alright, let's see what this baby can do." He raised his hands and summoned his energy. A shimmering dome of translucent blue light began to form around him, spreading outward like a bubble.
But before it fully stabilized, a loud crack burst from the surface and the dome shattered in a spray of static sparks. "Okay…" he muttered, grimacing. "Definitely not indestructible yet."
Dikshant spun a blade in his palm and hurled it toward a dummy. It veered slightly and struck too early, erupting in a short, concussive blast. The dummy rocked sideways, but so did Dikshant, who stumbled back.
"Uh... not what I aimed at." He looked down at his hand. Another shimmer formed beside him — a clone, ghostlike and identical, tilted its head and copied his shrug.
The clone vanished a moment later. They both turned to Shivam.
"You're up, spark-boy," Aman called. "You're the one keeping us from blowing ourselves up, right?"
Shivam inhaled slowly and moved to the center, his aura already vibrating with subtle force. He extended both arms and let the energy spill outward, forming a mesh-like wave. The moment it touched Dikshant and Aman, both their pulses calmed. The resonance meter blinked again.
"Aman: 87.1%. Dikshant: 86.8%," Mansi reported. "Shivam's aura has stabilized them."
Agastya's voice was firm but pleased. "You're forming more than a resonance. You're weaving a safety net. But be warned — maintaining that bond over time will cost you."
Shivam clenched his jaw. "It's like juggling everyone's breath. But… I can handle it."
"Good," Agastya said. "You'll need to."
They ran another round. This time, Aman's dome formed more steadily. Dikshant's knife flew true. The clone landed a hit. No one was perfect. No one was done learning. But for the first time — they didn't feel broken. They felt like a beginning. Together.
The team slumped against the walls of the training chamber, breath ragged and minds spinning. Their skin still pulsed faintly with energy, as if the Noctirum hadn't quite settled yet. The high of discovery had begun to fade, replaced now by the heavy ache of exertion and something deeper — uncertainty.
Aman rubbed his temples with both hands. "I feel like my insides are made of lightning and I don't have the wiring to handle it."
Dikshant chuckled weakly, leaning back against a crate. "Speak for yourself. I think I accidentally fried part of my soul. That last knife felt like throwing a bomb at my own face."
Naina exhaled slowly, still sitting cross-legged on the floor, her notebook discarded nearby. "This… this isn't just physical. It's in our heads too. It's like the energy is thinking with me."
Aanchal, arms folded, sat quietly beside her. Her eyes had a distant look — not unfocused, but over-aware. "I see movements before they happen. Like a second in advance. It's subtle… but constant. Makes it hard to turn off."
Shivam stood a little apart, watching them. His aura had dimmed for now, but his shoulders bore the weight of more than his own fatigue. He could still feel their rhythms — Aman's shield flickering beneath the surface, Dikshant's unstable resonance trying to split itself, the jagged edges of Naina's sight expanding, and the restless buzz in Aanchal's quickened pulse. All of them — pulsing around him like a star system struggling to stay in orbit.
Agastya entered with a data pad in hand, studying readings. "The results are promising, but uneven. You're stabilizing faster than I expected. That said, control is only the first layer. You've only just touched the surface of what you've become."
He looked at each of them in turn. "Powers drawn from Noctirum don't just feed on strength. They feed on will. And will is tied to memory, to loss, to fear and hope. That's why you're going to feel… things. Heavier. Clearer. And sometimes, more painful."
A heavy silence followed.
Dikshant broke it with a small, tired grin. "So, side effects include emotional overload, minor combustion, and existential dread. Awesome."
Naina smirked. "Better than dying." "Debatable," Aman groaned, stretching his arms. "Only if I don't short-circuit in my sleep."
Agastya's voice softened. "You'll be monitored over the next twenty-four hours. The chamber is prepped with aura regulators. If your pulse spikes, you'll feel it. Shivam — you'll be positioned close. Your stabilizer field is the best safety net we have."
Shivam nodded silently, already feeling the responsibility anchor deeper into his bones.
As the group was dismissed for recovery, the energy between them had changed. The jokes were still there, the friendship — but woven between the laughter were glances that lingered, a quiet bond forming in the wake of something extraordinary.
As night crept into the lower levels of the Mayapuri bunker, the training halls emptied, leaving behind only echoes of exertion and the lingering warmth of freshly awakened power. The team had returned to their shared quarters — not in celebration, but in exhaustion. Victory today was not a triumph. It was a beginning.
The air in the dorm was cool. Lights dimmed to a soft amber, casting long shadows across metal walls and stiff blankets. The quiet wasn't awkward — it was earned.
Aman lay on his bunk with one arm draped over his eyes. "Still feels like I've been run over by a tank. Twice." Dikshant chuckled weakly from the next bed. "You did collapse trying to summon that dome again." "I was pacing myself," Aman muttered. "Strategically."
Aanchal, sitting cross-legged by the foot of her bed, cracked her knuckles absentmindedly. "We all nearly passed out. I think that's part of the process."
Naina said nothing at first, flipping through her notes by the bedside light. Her eyes moved, but her thoughts weren't on the page. Finally, she closed the notebook and spoke, voice low. "We're stronger. But not ready."
That quiet honesty filled the room like gravity. Shivam stood by the far corner, leaning against the frame of the open door that led to the outer catwalk. His arms were crossed, but his face betrayed the weight he carried. He hadn't said much since they returned. Not since Agastya had warned him — your aura will be the net that holds them together, but it will drain you faster than any enemy ever could. But it wasn't the burden of energy that weighed him down now. It was her.
Adhivita. "She's out there," he said at last, voice steady but strained. "Every hour we spend training… she's still in their hold." The others fell silent.
"I keep thinking maybe I missed something," he continued. "Back at the mine. Somewhere in the moment when it all fell apart." "She wouldn't blame you," Naina said gently. "No," Aanchal added, her voice firmer. "But that doesn't mean we won't fix it."
None of them had answers. But they shared something else — the promise stitched into their silences. Far above them, on the fractured surface of the old world, stories were beginning to bloom.
Among the rebels in Vedhyra's tunnel networks, beneath the shattered domes of Sector Eighteen, and deep in the nomad grounds outside the Dominion patrol routes — a whisper was spreading. They didn't know his name. They hadn't seen his face.
But they had seen the footage — grainy, smuggled out through secret feeds. A figure cloaked in searing blue light, tearing through Dominion steel like parchment during the mine's breakout. Arms glowing. Aura flaring. Unstoppable.
The legend was already forming in the back alleys of slums and the hiding places of rebels: The God-Sparked One.
A name born not from strategy, but from awe. The Dominion hadn't caught on. Not yet. And Shivam's team? They had no idea what they were becoming. That was part of the plan.
Back in the quiet dorm, the team settled down for what little rest they could gather. Aman snored before the others even laid down. Dikshant drifted off still holding a dull training knife. Naina stared at the ceiling, eyes flicking between constellations only she could see. Aanchal remained watchful, half-asleep but alert.
Shivam stepped outside, the bunker doors sliding open with a soft hiss. The air outside was still and crisp. For the first time since arriving in this world, the night sky was clear — not choked with smog or riddled with electric haze. Above him, framed by the broken city skyline and twisted trees, hung the moon. Whole. Untouched. He stared at it in silence; hands curled at his sides. "I'll bring her back," he whispered. "No matter what it takes."
Far away, buried deep within the fortified heart of the Dominion capital, Adhivita sat alone in her cell — her back against the wall, legs drawn in close. The air was cold. The silence absolute. But above her, through a narrow slit of window just large enough to glimpse the sky, the moon shone down. Her gaze lifted to meet it, steady and calm. A single breath escaped her lips. "Soon."