Evening had fallen on the longest, most impossible day of my new life. Just that morning, I had been a stranger, and the four women now sharing the small space of the cottage had been starving in a cold, dark cave. Now, after a monster hunt that defied logic and a hasty move, the little home was a bustling hub of activity. The air, which had smelled of dust and old wood, was thick with the rich, complex aroma of spices—a scent of warmth, of safety, of a future that hadn't existed at sunrise.
With the premium Carrion Strider meat ready and a garden full of impossible treasures at my disposal, my mind, for the first time, wasn't occupied with survival or analyzing threats. It was buzzing with the tastes and smells of home. A proper meal. Not just for sustenance, but for the soul. Biryani was too complex for a rustic hearth, but a rich, fragrant Carrion Curry and fresh, handmade Roti… that was perfect. It was a taste of the life I'd lost, and I wanted to share it with the new family I'd found.
"Eve," I said, turning to the fierce guardian. She was sitting by the doorway, diligently sharpening one of the Carrion Strider's talons into a new, wickedly sharp knife. "I need a favour. Can you make me something? A flat, round piece of wood, and a smaller, cylindrical one. Like a small club."
She gave me a questioning look, her crimson eyes sharp but no longer hostile. "A board and a roller? What for?"
"For the bread," I said with a smile. She raised an eyebrow, a silent question in her gaze, but simply nodded. She grabbed a thick log of Shatterwood from the firewood pile. The impossible wood that had rebuffed her spear yielded to her skilled, powerful hands, and soon, she had carved a perfectly smooth, heavy board and a matching rolling pin. Her practicality was a thing of beauty.
While she worked, I began the curry. The sizzling of onions, garlic, and ginger in the pot was a sound of pure comfort. I added turmeric, coriander, and a touch of chili, the vibrant powders blooming into a fragrant paste. The sisters watched, mesmerized, as if I were an alchemist performing some strange, wonderful magic. When I added the chunks of tender Carrion Strider meat, the aroma became so intoxicatingly delicious that Eve, who was handing me the newly carved board, paused and swallowed hard, her mouth clearly watering.
Vesper, who was quietly organizing the berries they'd collected, took a deep, shaky breath, a rare, blissful smile gracing her timid face. "It smells so nice, Satvik," she whispered. "I've never smelled anything like this before."
"It's going to taste even better," I promised, giving her a reassuring smile that she shyly returned.
With the curry simmering, it was time for the Roti. I mixed the flour Eve had ground with water and a pinch of salt, kneading it into a soft dough. Sia, who had been watching my every move with a fascinated glint in her hazel eyes, slid up next to me.
"That looks fun," she said, her voice a warm purr. "Can I help?"
"Of course," I said, handing her a small ball of dough. "You just need to roll it out flat and round."
She took the heavy Shatterwood rolling pin and got to work. A minute later, she held up her creation. It was flat, but it was shaped something like a lopsided continent. She pouted, a playful, adorable expression.
"Mine's not round," she complained. "How do you make it a perfect circle?"
I moved behind her, the warmth from her body a pleasant surprise. I placed my hands over hers on the rolling pin, guiding her movements. "It's all in the pressure," I explained, my voice a little lower than I intended. "You press down a little more on the edges as you roll. Like this."
We worked together for a moment, the rhythm of our movements easy and natural. The air was filled with the scent of spices and the faint, sweet perfume that seemed to cling to her. It felt… couple-like. Frighteningly, wonderfully couple-like. She finally managed to roll a mostly-round Roti and looked up at me, her face flushed with a triumphant smile. "Practice," I said, my voice a little thick. "That's all it takes."
While we were occupied, Sera had taken some of the fish and mushrooms she'd foraged and marinated them in a simple mix of spices I'd prepared. She was now roasting them over a separate part of the fire, the smoky, savory scent blending with the rich aroma of the curry.
The feast that night was a revelation. We all sat on the floor around the hearth, the flickering firelight dancing on our faces. I served the steaming curry into wooden bowls, placed a stack of warm, soft Roti in the middle, and laid out the roasted fish and mushrooms on a flat stone. For a moment, we all just stared at the food, the sheer color and aroma of it an overwhelming spectacle.
Vesper was the first to try anything. She timidly tore off a piece of Roti, her movements hesitant as if she expected it to vanish. She put it in her mouth, and her crimson eyes went wide. "Oh," she whispered, her voice filled with wonder. "It's so… soft. And warm."
Sia, ever the bold one, dipped her Roti straight into the curry and took a big bite. Her hazel eyes immediately fluttered shut, and a soft, pleased sigh escaped her lips. "Oh my… Satvik, what is this magic? It's warm and… and tingly on my tongue, but in a good way! What is that?"
"That's… spicy," I tried to explain. "It's from the chili."
Eve, the pragmatist, went straight for the meat. She took a bite of the Carrion Strider curry, chewing slowly, her expression intensely analytical. Then her usual fierce mask broke for just a second. A look of pure, unadulterated shock. "The meat…" she said, her voice a low rumble of disbelief. "It's not tough at all. How did you make it so tender? And what is this… this thick sauce?"
Sera, watching her sisters' reactions, finally took a bite of the roasted mushroom. A single tear escaped her eye and traced a path through the dirt on her cheek. She didn't bother to wipe it away. "I… I don't have words," she said, her voice choked with emotion. "I've eaten Carrion Strider before. We had to boil it for hours, and it was still tough as leather. It never tasted like this. It never tasted like… anything."
They ate with a focused reverence, the silence in the room punctuated by soft hums of pleasure from Vesper and delighted sighs from Sia.
"What's this on the fish?" Eve asked, pointing at it with a piece of Roti. "This yellow powder?"
"That's turmeric," I said. "And the green specks are coriander."
"Turmeric… coriander…" Sia repeated the words slowly, as if they were from a spellbook. "They're like… little explosions of taste. All my life, food was just… fuel. Something to stop your stomach from hurting. I never knew it could be… this. I never knew it could make you happy."
We ate until we were full, a feeling I suspected they hadn't experienced in a very long time. The conversation was light and easy after that, filled with questions about the different spices and the strange new flavors they were experiencing. For the first time since arriving in this world, surrounded by their laughter, I felt a sense of belonging. A sense of home.
Later that night, the cottage was quiet. The four sisters, completely and utterly exhausted from the emotional rollercoaster of the day—from starvation and fear to a miraculous rescue and a feast—were fast asleep. They were huddled together on the furs and blankets we had arranged, a pile of limbs and hair, looking for all the world like a litter of sleeping pups. The only sound was the soft crackle of the dying embers in the hearth and the gentle rhythm of their breathing.
But I couldn't sleep.
Sleep should have been easy after a day like this, a day that had demanded more from me physically and emotionally than any day in my previous life. But my mind was a whirlwind, processing the impossible events. The god in the white void. This new, powerful body. The four beautiful, vibrant women who now, somehow, depended on me. I felt a weight of responsibility so immense it was almost suffocating, yet it wasn't an unpleasant feeling. It was… a purpose. The sound of Sia's laughter as she discovered what 'spicy' meant still echoed in my ears.
Needing to move, I quietly got up from my spot by the fire. I paced the small cottage, my bare feet silent on the rough wooden floorboards. I was a stranger here, an anomaly, a ghost inhabiting another man's life. Who was he? The boy whose body I now wore? The kind soul who had planted a garden of impossible treasures?
As I walked past the cot where Sera and her sisters now slept, my hand brushed against a floorboard that felt slightly loose. My curiosity piqued, I knelt down. It was a simple trick, a board not fully nailed down. I lifted it. Tucked away in the small, hidden space beneath was a small, worn, leather-bound diary.
My heart began to pound.
I took the diary and sat by the faint, orange glow of the embers, the sleeping forms of the sisters a comforting presence in the shadows. I opened it. The script was unlike anything I had ever seen. It wasn't the Devanagari of my homeland or the Latin alphabet of my studies. It was a fluid, elegant series of symbols and runes, flowing across the page like music. For a heartbeat, I felt a pang of disappointment, assuming it would be unreadable.
But as my eyes traced the alien shapes, a strange thing happened. The symbols... they resolved themselves in my mind. Without any conscious effort, the meaning flowed directly into my thoughts, as clear as if it were written in my mother tongue. My breath hitched. It was another miracle, another impossible perk of this new life. The god's blessing... it must have come with an inbuilt translator for any language I encountered.
With a new sense of reverence, I began to read. The diary belonged to him—the previous Satvik. The boy whose life I had inherited. I learned his story, a tragic tale that explained so much. He was the son of a wealthy and kind spice merchant, part of a family that had traded in rare and exotic seeds for generations. That was the secret of the garden. He wrote of a happy, sun-drenched childhood, of the love of his parents, of a life filled with warmth and flavour.
Then, the darkness. A rival merchant, a cruel and greedy man, grew jealous of their success. He hired assassins. The diary spoke of fire, of screams in the night, of escaping with nothing but the clothes on his back and a pouch of his family's most precious seeds. He had become a fugitive, running for his life, which is how he had ended up in the remote, dangerous safety of the Marrowmaw Forest.
I turned to the final page. The elegant handwriting was gone, replaced by a weak, frantic scrawl, the ink blotted in places as if by tears or drops of blood.
"I'm sorry, Mia. I'm so sorry. I wasn't strong enough to save you from your family. I wanted to come for you, but my body is failing me. I vomit blood every morning. My hair is falling out in clumps. There are knots of pain in my body that never go away. The arrow they shot me with when I tried to help you… the poison… it's eating me from the inside. I will regret not being able to save you until my last breath. If someone is reading this… please, find her. Save my Mia. Goodbye."
I stared at the words, a cold dread seeping into my bones. My scientific mind, the old engineer, took over. Vomiting blood. Hair loss. Knots under the skin—tumors. It wasn't a simple poison. It was a powerful, fast-acting carcinogen. Something designed to cause a slow, agonizing death, a cellular breakdown. A truly horrific way to die.
I closed the diary, a profound sense of sympathy and indebtedness washing over me. This boy… this other Satvik… his life had been just as tragic as mine, but in a different way. He had known love and family, and it had all been violently ripped away from him. And in his final moments, his greatest regret was not his own death, but his failure to save someone named Mia.
I thought of my old life, of the sterile, lonely world I had escaped. A tradition from my homeland came to mind. In India, even the last wish of a criminal on death row is honored if possible. And this boy… he wasn't a criminal. He was my savior. He had unwittingly given me this body, this second chance at life. The least I could do was honor his final wish.
I looked over at the sleeping forms of the four sisters, a new family I was just beginning to know, a family I was now sworn to protect. Then I looked out the small window at the moonlit forest, at the strange, beautiful, and dangerous world that was now my own. I made a solemn, quiet promise, not to a god, but to the ghost whose life I now led.
"I don't know who this Mia is, or where I can find her," I whispered into the quiet of the cottage. "But I promise you, I will. I will save her."
I placed a hand over my heart, over the body he had given me.
"You can rest in peace, Satvik."
The weight of a new, heavy, and deeply personal quest settled firmly on my shoulders. I was no longer just a survivor. I was a man with a promise to keep.