The Failure
Lightning cracked over Mumbai's skyline as a dim light flickered in a cluttered basement lab.
Broken wires, burnt circuits, and half-finished blueprints surrounded a man who looked like he'd been awake for days.
Dhirendra Sharma, age 29, stared at his half-built device — a strange metallic ring wired to a dozen old CPUs.
Sweat dripped down his temple.
> "Just one more try…" he whispered to himself.
"Maybe this time it won't explode."
He pressed the switch.
The machine buzzed, glowed blue for a second — then hissed out a puff of smoke.
Darkness again.
Dhirendra slumped back in his chair. Another failure. Another wasted month.
His entire life had been like this — every project a dead end, every dream crushed before it began.
And tonight, even the only person who believed in him… was gone.
His phone screen still showed the last message from Aarika, his long-distance girlfriend from another country — five years of calls, chats, and promises.
> "I'm sorry, Dhirendra. My family doesn't approve. I can't do this anymore."
Call ended. Silence.
He sat in the cold lab, staring at nothing.
> "Maybe I was never meant to succeed…" he muttered.
---
The Accident
He turned to his machine again — a device he once believed could "bend time particles."
Everyone had laughed. Now he laughed at himself.
Still… something inside him whispered to try again.
> "One last time."
He rewired the final node, twisted a copper coil, and hit the switch.
The ring hummed — this time not blue, but golden.
The air vibrated.
Electric arcs leaped across the lab.
> "What the—?"
Before he could move, a surge of light swallowed him whole.
His scream was lost in the storm of energy.
---
Awakening in Another World
When he opened his eyes, everything was silent.
No hum of machines. No city noise.
Only birds… and a golden sky.
He sat up, confused. The ground beneath him was soft grass.
In the distance stood mountains — and at their base, a temple glowing with sunlight.
> "Where… where the hell am I?"
"Not hell," a calm voice answered behind him.
He spun around.
An old man with silver hair and saffron robes sat under a banyan tree. His eyes gleamed with something beyond human understanding.
> "You are far from your world, son. Far from your time."
Dhirendra's breath caught.
> "Who are you?"
> "A seer. But you… you are something stranger. Your mind screams of machines and wires… yet your soul burns like fire."
The man smiled.
> "Tell me, child — what year were you born?"
> "Two thousand and… twenty-five."
The sage's eyes narrowed.
> "Ah. Then destiny truly weaves a strange fabric."
---
The Gurukul of Light
Within hours, Dhirendra followed the sage through an ancient valley where young disciples trained with glowing weapons and levitating stones.
A Gurukul, but unlike any he'd seen in textbooks.
> "They're using… energy fields?" Dhirendra whispered.
> "Not fields," the sage replied. "Pran Urja — the force of life itself."
The scientist inside him couldn't stop observing.
The teacher inside him couldn't stop learning.
> "Can I… can I learn this too?"
> "If you can empty your mind of logic," the sage smiled, "you might just fill it with power."
---
The First Spark
That night, sitting beneath the stars, Dhirendra tried to meditate.
He focused. He breathed. He failed — again and again.
Frustrated, he clenched his fists.
> "This is impossible! I'm not like them!"
The sage appeared silently behind him.
> "You are exactly like them, Dhirendra. You just don't remember what you are."
He placed his hand on Dhirendra's forehead.
For a moment, everything stopped.
A rush of images flooded his mind — galaxies, equations, fire, gods, and ancient wars.
Then a voice, deep and monstrous, echoed inside him:
> "You don't belong here, human… yet you will decide how this world ends."
Dhirendra gasped, eyes glowing faint blue.
The grass around him trembled.
The sage watched, calm and smiling.
> "Yes," he said softly. "The awakening has begun."