Chapter 1 - Prologue

The tranquil serenity of the fertile river delta was shattered as a heavy storm beyond imagining descended upon the vast ocean that bordered the peaceful farmlands. The once bustling fields stood abandoned as the farmers fled into their sturdy homes, terror etched across their faces. Whispers of divine wrath spread like wildfire. Many posited it as the heavens smiting them for their sins both knowingly and unknowingly committed.

Amidst the deafening cacophony of thunder and the relentless downpour, a sudden and brilliant flash of heavenly lightning pierced through the inky sky. It was as though the very fabric of reality had been torn asunder, leaving a jagged rupture in the cosmic tapestry. Through it, was nothing but an endless void - a gateway into the chaos that existed in the realm between realms.

From this rupture, a figure was ejected, ashen white with a spiralling, red birthmark marking his face and body. His presence was an enigma and his body was battered and broken. Crimson trails of blood dripped from a large, gaping wound in his abdomen, marring his pallid skin. The figure's breathing was laboured and ragged, and he clung to the precipice of death itself. With each struggling breath, he sank into the churning waters below, disappearing beneath the tumultuous waves and swallowed into the unforgiving abyss.

As minutes stretched into eternity, the storm's fury began to abate. The thunderous roars faded into distant echoes, and the relentless rain transformed into a gentle drizzle. It was then that the impossible occurred.

From the depths of the ocean, the near-death figure rose once more, carried by an unseen force. He ascended slowly, his ashen form breaking the surface of the water. It was as if the river itself was cradling him. With uncanny grace, the river seemed to take charge. The near-lifeless body was carried upstream against its current. Against all reason and natural laws, the ashen figure floated serenely like a ghost, caressed by the river's mysterious embrace.

The farmers, peering out from their shelters, watched in awe as the enigmatic figure and the river's inexplicable benevolence defied all natural laws. As the days passed and weeks turned into months, the story of a river ghost turned from a folk legend into an old wives' tale, until eventually it faded from existence altogether.

___

As the first rays of the sun kissed the horizon, casting a golden glow upon the tranquil waters of the sacred river Ganga, a sage stood immersed in devotion. The sage, adorned in simple saffron robes with his forehead plastered with three horizontal lines of dried ash with a thin line of red turmeric bisecting them, stood waist-deep in the flowing currents, his eyes closed in serene concentration. The cool morning breeze gently caressed his weathered face as he prepared to perform the sacred ritual of Sandhyavandanam. He cupped a handful of the sacred water and rubbed his yajnopavita, three sets of three white circular threads that ran diagonally from his left shoulder to his right waist, cleaning it.

His long black hair cascaded down his back. In his arms, which were unusually muscular and calloused for a brahmin, he held a copper vessel filled with water. With each breath, he recited the ancient chants and hymns, invoking the divine forces that resided in the celestial realms above. The sage's voice, resonant and filled with spiritual energy, harmonized with the rustling leaves and the rhythmic flow of the holy river.

His face, etched with wisdom and unwavering faith, reflected the profound connection he shared with the divine. The sage's devotion was palpable as if the very air around him shimmered with a sacred presence. Every movement and every gesture was deliberate and infused with reverence.

As the sun's radiant disc gradually emerged, casting a brilliant glow upon the water, the sage cupped his hands, raising them to the heavens. With utmost devotion, he began the achamanam, the ritual sipping of water, purifying himself to commune with the gods.

"Om Achyutaaya Namaha. Om Ananthaya Namaha. Om Govindaya Nahama."

With each name called, the sage sipped water flowing through the crease splitting his right wrist. Once finished, he moved on to the next step.

"Om Keshavaya Namaha," he said while touching his right cheek with his right thumb.

"Om Narayanaya Namaha,*" he said while touching his left cheek with his right thumb.

"Om Madhavaya Namaha," he said while touching his right eye with his ring finger.

"Om Govindaya Namaha," he said while touching his left eye with his ring finger.

"Om Vishnave Namaha," he said while touching the right side of his nose with his index finger.

"Om Madhusudhanaya Namaha," he said while touching the left side of his nose with his index finger.

"Om Trivikramaya Namaha," he said while touching his right ear with his little finger.

"Om Vamanaya Namaha," he said while touching his left ear with his little finger.

"Om Shridharaya Namaha," he said while touching his right shoulder with his middle finger.

"Om Hrishikeshaya Namaha," he said while touching his left shoulder with his middle finger.

"Om Padmanabhaya Namaha," he said while touching his navel with all four of his fingers and thumb folded inwards.

"Om Damodaraya Namaha," he said while touching his head with all four of his fingers and thumb folded inwards.

He pressed his open palms together and held them in prayer against his chest. After taking a long breath, he continued chanting.

"Om Sankarshanaya Namaha."

"Om Vasudevaya Namaha."

"Om Pradyumnaya Namaha."

"Om Anirudhaya Namaha."

"Om Purushothamaya Namaha."

"Om Adhokshajaya Namaha."

"Om Narasimhaya-"

At that instant, something collided against the sage's torso, bringing him out of his ascetic trance. His eyes turned into daggers as he looked around for the interloper who dared to interrupt the most sacred of morning prayers. Whoever, or whatever it was, would inevitably face his wrath and would receive its due, if not in this life then maybe the next one, or the one after.

But his wrath hitched just as the curse reached his lips because his gaze landed on a figure floating beside him. It was a bald man with pale skin, possibly due to blood loss from the large gaping hole in his abdomen caused by a large sword piercing through, or because he was caked in ash. A red birthmark cut through the left side of his face, over his head and left eye, and another spiralling red birthmark snaked around the left side of his torso, ending on his left shoulder.

For all intents and purposes, the man should be dead. But his chest heaved just barely, meaning that life still clung on to him... though only barely. The sage looked towards the direction where the body came from, it was flowing against the current.

"You want me to save him?" The Sage asked the river. In turn, the water churned and bubbled, returning an affirmation. "Why?"

To that, the river had no response. But the sage revealed a faint smile and answered his question, "Have you gotten so tired of carting away the ashes of the dead?"

"Let me finish, then," the sage said before continuing his prayers. But he was once again interrupted by the body hitting him, and nudging him out of concentration. He clicked his tongue in annoyance and looked at the bright disk that had finally leapt off the horizon. He considered the situation thoroughly before letting out a tired sigh.

"Forgive me today, oh Lord!" He said out loud. "But they do say that saving one life is more meritorious than constructing a hundred temples."

He then dipped underwater and ascended while lifting the unconscious body over his shoulders. The move was effortless, as though the over-a-hundred-kilo, muscular mountain of a man was as light as a feather. The sage walked out of the river with steady steps, while latching the copper vessel in his hands against a hook by his hips. As he stepped onto the river bank, he once again looked towards the flowing river.

"This man should have died, and yet he didn't. It was your action, against the prescribed flow of nature, that has saved him. For that, he will owe you. You may not have expected anything in return, but that only raises the righteousness of this act," the sage orated. He then dipped the tip of his ring finger into the water in the copper vessel by his waist and drew a symbol on the right side of the unconscious man's neck, causing it to glow for a short moment. "This mark will ensure that the man won't forget your act of goodwill. And when the time comes, and you wish to collect the favour you have done him, the mark will assure of his acquiescence."

The undulating river subsided and continued its usual behaviour as the sage's words echoed all around.

After giving one short bow to the Sun above, the River before, and the Earth below, the sage walked towards the dense shrubbery. At that moment, he extended his free right hand outwards, palm open. Through the forestry, the sound of something cutting through the wind resonated, until eventually a hand-axe appeared while spinning dangerously. It whipped straight towards the sage's open palm and its wooden handle landed safely in his grasp.

As the wood made contact with his skin a mysterious and malicious energy started to resonate from the bloody metal, before coursing through his veins causing them to pop out with a molten red shade. The sage bit down on the painful assault, that targeted both his physique and psyche before spinning the tool in his grasp and hanging it against another hook by his waistline.

The sage made his way towards the dense shrubbery. As he did so, he started to sing hymns that mellowed the furious winds that rustled the tree branches.

"Om trayambakam yajamahe, sugandhim pushti-vardhanam,"

We sacrifice to the Three-eyed One the fragrant, increaser of prosperity.

"Uruvarukamiva bandhanan, mrityor mukshiya ma mrtat."

Like a cucumber from its stem, might I be freed from death, not from deathlessness.

___

"You disappoint me, Spartan," Athena's ethereal form said with a disdainful frown. Then, with a sudden yank, she pulled the Blade of Olympus from his abdomen. Blood spurted and gushed out like a fountain.

As he saw Athena's receding figure, which eventually disappeared as her ethereal form dissipated, Kratos could feel his life wavering, flickering away with each passing second. But he wasn't a patient man.

'My vengeance ends now,' he'd promised himself. But Kratos was a weapon of vengeance.

As long as he lived - as long as the weapon of vengeance still burned - his promise would remain unfulfilled.

With great difficulty, Kratos rolled over, causing another burst of blood to gush out of his body. With all his strength, he dragged himself to the edge of the cliff at the peak of Mount Olympus. He looked over the edge and saw an endless chasm below. There was probably an end, but the wrathful storms that affected the world around him clouded his vision - and his current state teetering between life and death definitely did not work in his favour.

Kratos let out a long, laboured breath and absorbed the state of the world that remained. His path of vengeance was unforgiving. He was reminded of a fable he heard from a travelling storyteller during his time in the army. A horse roamed a vast and beautiful meadow with great comfort. It was his kingdom. But one day, his kingdom was invaded, by a herd of deer led by a mighty stag. The herd was hungry and insensitive to the meadow's natural beauty. All they sought was sustenance, and they reaped from the meadow mercilessly. The horse tried to chase them away, but he was unsuccessful. They would leave, disperse, but eventually return and continue their culling. The horse had had enough and decided to recruit help. He approached the humans, even though his mother had warned him against doing so. She told him they were strong and duplicitous, a very dangerous combination. But the horse lacked wisdom, all he could see was the problem before him. Upon approaching a human, the horse relayed his problem.

"Oh, that's easy!" The human man said. "Though I will need your help."

"Anything to get those interlopers out of my meadow!" The horse declared.

"If you allow me to saddle you and mount you, I will carry a set of javelins and get rid of those deer for you," the man promised.

And so, the horse willingly surrendered its freedom and adorned the saddle and bridle, and allowed the human to sit atop it.

"What are you doing?" The horse asked as the man placed two dark cups against each of its eyes.

"Have you ever become distracted and lost your momentum while you galloped quickly?" The man asked.

"Once in a while," the horse admitted.

"These help you focus while you move," the man said to assuage the horse's growing discomfort.

And thus, the hunt began. The man and the horse brought down many a deer of the herd. And amongst the first few killed was the mighty stag that would taunt the horse. In its dying breath, the miscreant said.

"You fool! We were just hungry, looking to survive the coming winter. We would have left, and your meadow would have been all yours. But now, you have truly lost your kingdom."

The horse did not understand what the stag said. It was revelling in its victory.

"Now you can take all of it off, right?" The horse asked the human.

"Not yet, our mission still remains incomplete," the human responded. "But first, I need your assistance in moving some things."

The horse didn't question the human and went on with the assigned task. Days turned to weeks that turned to months. And many years later, on a particular day, while the horse was dragging along something heavy tethered to it, the blinders fell off.

The first thing the horse saw was a tree. It was familiar with that tree. It was the only tree in its meadow that produced red and juicy apples. But everything around the tree was different. The green fields were yellow, with wheat growing on them instead of vibrant grass and flowers.

"W-What is this?"

The horse turned around and saw that it was tethered to a large, shovel-like device - a plough. In some cruel twist of fate, the horse was carrying the very thing that ruined its kingdom.

In its thirst for vengeance, the horse had sacrificed its freedom and lost the very kingdom it sought to protect.

Kratos' world was ending, it was evident. No amount of hope could salvage what remained. And all of this was his fault. Kratos closed his eyes before rolling over and allowing himself to fall off the edge of the cliff. The wind picked up as he fell, cutting into him as his speed grew faster, and faster. Within seconds, he was through the storm clouds that hung below the Mountain. Cold water droplets collided against his skin as he kept falling. He could hear ear-shattering thunder as the charged clouds finally discharged the energy accumulating inside them.

Kratos kept falling. He pressed his lids even tighter, anticipating his end. His consciousness drifted away, as the blood loss sent his body into hibernation.

Whatever happened after, Kratos did not know. But he was certain of one thing: he wasn't dead. The last thing he felt was a sudden end of nature's furious assault. Then it was just cold emptiness... Until suddenly, it all came back. His consciousness returned in short flashes. He saw water; he tasted the sea. He saw a furious storm above him. He felt himself drowning.

He let himself go into the sea's enraged grips. Without Poseidon to tame it, the waters were unforgiving - a fitting comeuppance for Kratos, the man who took the life of the God of the Seas.

It was all going to end, finally... Until it didn't. Kratos could sense his breath again. He could hear, he could smell. He could touch!

His eyes burst open, with confusion and unending rage billowing out of them. The first thing he saw, was a face. A man with long, untamed facial hair and matted hair looked down at him with a blank stare. His forehead was plastered with dried ash and a thin red line cutting through it vertically.

"Welcome to the world of the living," the man said.

Kratos' hand moved subconsciously, with the swiftness of a viper, he grabbed the man by his throat and applied force.

"Why?!" Kratos said with a guttural grunt.

"Why did you save me?! Why didn't you just let me die!"

Kratos could feel the rage growing inside him. What of justice? What of his rightful death? For all the sins he'd committed, why was he still alive?!

His palms crushed down with increasing strength, as Kratos let the anger take over. But to his surprise, the man grabbed Kratos' hand pushed his thumb into the centre of the choking palm and pressed hard.

Kratos did not anticipate such force coming from a man with such a wiry frame. Like a clam, his palm slowly drifted open, releasing the hairy man.

"Look, I figured that you probably attempted to end your own life," the man said while standing up. Kratos tried to follow, but a sharp pain assaulted his abdomen. Looking down, he saw his stomach bandaged thoroughly. "Given the trajectory of the sword strike, it was a coin toss between two possibilities: you were either killed by someone at a much higher elevation compared to you, or you tried to kill yourself. You have a warrior's frame, so the former was less likely..."

"And for the record," the man continued as he returned with a mortar and pestle with a green paste inside it. "I wasn't the one who saved you, technically. I am just the healer. The one who saved you was someone else."

"Who?" Kratos demanded.

"I will introduce you to her, later-"

"Her?"

"Her, him," the man said with a shrug. "They prefer her. She's been a she for a large portion of her existence. But She can be a he too, on very rare occasions," the man rattled.

"Speak sense!" Kratos shot back.

"What matters," the man said while waving his hand. "Is that your debt is to be repaid with her."

"Debt?" Kratos said with a scoff. "I never asked to be saved. Why should I owe anyone anything?"

The man shook his head with a morose frown and said, "A life is a life regardless of whether you deem it valuable or not. It is sinful to blame someone for trying to save another, even if the one being saved did not wish to be. To save someone is a pure act of selflessness, do not disparage it."

Kratos let out an irritated snort and tried to get up from the mat he was lying on. He let out a painful groan while clasping the bandaged stab wound while stumbling and hobbling.

"Do not move," the man instructed forcefully. "You cannot fathom the difficulty I faced in trying to set your internal organs back to the way they were supposed to be."

"I don't care," Kratos spat back.

"What are you trying to do?"

Kratos ignored the man's question and pushed through the wooden door to the thatched house he was in. A flood of sunlight hit his face, partially blinding him as his eyes got used to it. The sounds of songbirds and morning insects danced across his ears while his vision finally turned clear. He was deep inside a forest - a beautiful green and serene landscape.

"H-How?" Kratos mumbled. The world he last saw was in tatters. He turned towards the only other individual in his vicinity and growled angrily, "Undo this witchcraft this instant!"

The man squinted his eyes in disbelief and retorted, "It seems the blood loss has affected your brain."

"What?!"

"What makes you think you are being subjected to witchcraft?"

Kratos pointed aggressively at the beautiful scenery and yelled, "The world! It- It should have ended..."

"As evident with what you can sense before you, the world is very much intact," the man denied. "Why do you believe the world to have ended?"

"Because-" Kratos started, but upon absorbing the apparent reality before him, he was stumped. He had no answers. Maybe it was witchcraft, maybe it wasn't. But in all honesty, it didn't matter to him. He wanted this to be real - he sorely wished for it to be the true reality because deep down, Kratos wished to undo everything. Every decision he made, every word spoken, everything! He wanted to take it all back!

"Because...?" The man parrotted.

"You should have left me to die," Kratos spat out.

To that, the man did not respond. He merely looked at Kratos with an evaluating gaze that unnerved him. For a minute, Kratos felt like his entire history was being unravelled before the man's eyes - he felt naked.

"Killing yourself isn't the way out," the man said with a hint of empathy in his voice. "If you wish to atone, then live. By dying, you simply transfer the sins of your current lifetime to your next. Worse yet, you may not remember the sins of your past lifetime after your rebirth, and thus you will have doomed a truly innocent being to a life worse than death."

"What are you blabbering about?" Kratos snapped back with furrowed brows.

"No man inherits the good or evil of another. The fruits reaped will be of the seed that is sowed, be it in this lifetime or next. And the quality of the fruit is determined by the quality of the seed," the man preached.

"You speak baselessly," Kratos accused. "You know nothing of me!"

"No? But I could recognise those eyes anywhere," the man retaliated with a bitter smile. He then quickly shook his head, cleared his face of morose reminiscence and said, "Look at what you've done now! Your wound is bleeding again."

Kratos snarled while hobbling away.

"Where are you going?" The man called out.

Kratos did not answer.

"You will die," the man reminded.

"Then that will be my fate," Kratos said plainly.

"I cannot let that happen," the man said as he started to follow Kratos.

"Leave me be!" Kratos yelled over his shoulder while suppressing a pained groan. But he could see that the man was not letting up. Kratos did not have the energy to argue with the man, so he kept walking onward through the trees.

He kept walking, stumbling intermittently, yet trudging through the forest with great difficulty. His gaze wandered everywhere, absorbing the scenery with great scrutiny. Inwardly, he hoped that it was true - that the world really hadn't ended. This went on for what seemed like hours, until eventually, Kratos could see a clearing through the treeline.

As he finally broke through the shrubbery, Kratos was surprised to see a bustling farming village before him. Men wearing ragged cloth wrapped around their legs worked tirelessly on the fields, while women garbed in colourful cotton clothing spun around them and carried baskets of harvested grain to and fro. Kids assisted and played around, their joyous voices elicited an overall aura of prosperity and happiness. It was as if the world-ending calamities were just a fever dream.

Who knows, maybe they were! Maybe Kratos had suffered a grievous wound against the Alrik, those barbarians, that day and died. Whatever followed was just an illusory dream. But a quick look at his wrists, with the garish burns from when the cursed chains wrapped around them, snapped Kratos back to reality... this particular reality because he was certain that he was no longer in Greece.

One of the farmers looked up and cleaned his brow of sweat using the rag hanging behind him when his eyes met Kratos'. The man quickly rushed towards the pale figure, worry etched on his face.

"&@$@%!" The man said. Kratos squinted and leaned closer.

"&@$@%@#@?" This was a question, Kratos was sure of it. But he did not understand a word. At that moment, the man's eyes looked past Kratos and landed on the long-haired man following him. The farmer quickly bowed and rattled off a few words, to which the long-haired man raised a palm and responded with a single phrase as a blessing of sorts.

"You aren't from here," the man said to Kratos in words he could understand. "You don't speak their language, hence you cannot communicate with them."

"But you know Greek?" Kratos exclaimed.

"I don't know Greek. I can speak to you, I can understand you, but I don't speak the same language you do," the man said cryptically but with a serious expression. He then tapped his chest and his forehead before tapping Kratos' chest and forehead, "I can understand what goes on in here, and in here. And I can communicate directly with you through that. In the same way, I can talk to animals, the trees, the wind and the sea."

"Witchcraft!" Kratos snapped derisively.

"Not Witchcraft!" the man said with an equally angry snarl. "I have simply learned to speak the language of the world. Everything in the world communicates, I have learned how to decipher that and respond in turn."

The man then greeted the rest of the peasant folk gathering around with reverent gazes on their faces before turning back towards the forest. "Let us return. If you wish to survive here, the least you need to know is to express your needs and wants. I will teach you to read, speak and write."

With that said, the man disappeared into the shrubbery, leaving Kratos alone. He looked at the dispersing crowd and tried to absorb the illegible mumbling resonating amidst them. After a long moment of painful contemplation, Kratos too turned and walked down the same path as the long-haired man.

___

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