"After all, I am going to kill you, God," the Rakshas said, grinning with manic excitement.
"Try and fail," Aaryan replied coldly.
"Okay, then."
And their battle began once again.
Both of them were strong—monstrously so—but even after its transformation, the Rakshas still couldn't keep up with Aaryan. Every clash between them shook the air, yet Aaryan stood unshaken. Even now, he was proving to everyone—perhaps to himself—that he was the strongest.
"Were you this strong since birth, God?" the Rakshas asked, a huge grin spreading across its face.
Aaryan remained silent, his expression unreadable.
"It's fine if you don't wish to answer your devotee," the Rakshas continued mockingly. "After all, you, God—the being above all—have the right to choose whom to answer. But tell me, God… do you have the power to choose by whose hands you'll die?"
As those words echoed, its power surged again—violent, overflowing. The crimson aura thickened, devouring the air around it.
Sensing something wrong, Aaryan instantly retreated. But even as he evaded, his left hand brushed against the crimson energy. His finger burned instantly—but to him, it was nothing.
A faint mist curled around the burn, and within a blink, the wound sealed itself. Instantaneous.
"You talk too much, my devotee," Aaryan said, lowering into his fighting stance.
"Did your finger hurt, God?" The Rakshas stepped through its own aura as if walking through a door into another world.
And their assault resumed.
The Rakshas was faster now—faster, stronger, more feral. For a brief moment, even Aaryan was surprised by the sheer rise in its power. But the shock lasted only a heartbeat. In front of him, everything else was merely another creature.
Then the tide turned again.
Aaryan vanished and reappeared before the Rakshas, dodging its twin blades effortlessly. His fist drove into its back, sending it crashing forward. Before it even hit the ground, Aaryan was already there, his foot slamming into its chin, launching it skyward.
He followed with a storm of blows—each one silent, swift, and deadly.
Fists, kicks, illusions, impact.
A dance of divinity and destruction.
Physically, Aaryan was unmatched.
But mentally—he'd already lost.
"Was I this strong from birth?" he thought. "The truth is… yes. I never earned any of this. I was born strong. Born perfect. Born as what others spend lifetimes chasing. Strength, intellect, beauty—everything came to me unearned.
But then… am I even worthy of myself?"
He was elegance carved into flesh, perfection molded by destiny—but within, there was nothing but chaos and doubt.
Aaryan: the God to all, yet a stranger to himself.
The strongest in every eye but his own.
The God who suspects his divinity.
"I guess I really am just a lucky bastard who got it all," he thought. A faint, self-mocking smile tugged at his lips—a smile so small it might have never existed.
But even that invisible smile didn't escape the Rakshas' eyes.
"God!" the Rakshas roared, its body breaking under Aaryan's barrage, yet its eyes gleamed with manic delight. "You're smiling! Did I impress you?!"
"Think whatever you want," Aaryan said, his voice calm, detached. "After all, this will be the last thing you ever think."
His speed spiked again.
His blows grew heavier, faster—imperceptible.
The Rakshas felt it—the crushing, cosmic difference between them.
"I knew you were stronger," it shouted amid the chaos. "But to be this strong—God, I think the beast here is you!"
"Yes," Aaryan replied, voice cold as winter wind. "I am this strong. You are nothing but a fly to me."
Something within the Rakshas cracked.
"A fly, huh?" it muttered, its tone hollow. "Even after everything I did to attain power… I'm still just a fly to you."
The usual thrill in its voice vanished, replaced by something Aaryan had never seen before—pain.
But the expression lasted only a heartbeat.
The Rakshas' crimson aura surged again, reaching for the heavens.
"Then I'll prove it to you!" it screamed. "I'll prove my strength—the strength I earned! I'll prove that I am mortal, too!"
Its grin returned—but now, its eyes carried something else. Complexity. Conviction. Humanity.
> "Now, God," it said, "watch closely. You're not the only one who's been holding back."
Aaryan took a step backward, his gaze sharpening.
The Rakshas stepped out of its aura once more.
> "Behold my power, God! The power of void—and tell me—"
Its words stopped abruptly.
"Tell you what?" Aaryan asked, his tone flat, expression still.
In a flash, it was over.
The Rakshas blinked—confused, disoriented. It hadn't even realized what had happened.
Then Aaryan lifted his right hand, slow and deliberate, as if raising a trophy.
But it wasn't a trophy.
It was the Rakshas' head.
"I asked something," Aaryan said quietly, bringing the severed head close. "Can't you hear?"