The first thing Abhijishya became aware of was warmth—soft sheets against her skin, the faint scent of incense in the air, and the murmur of voices speaking in a language she didn’t recognize. The voices were gentle, but something about them sent a prickle of unease down her spine.

She blinked, her eyelashes fluttering as she tried to open her eyes, only to squint at the golden light flooding the room. Her body ached, her throat was dry, and her limbs felt heavy, as if she had been asleep for too long. She attempted to sit up, pushing against the mattress, but a firm yet gentle hand rested on her arm, guiding her carefully into an upright position. A soft pillow was tucked behind her back, offering support.

She barely had time to process before someone murmured something beside her—words that made no sense. Her ears caught the lilt of an unfamiliar language, the syllables flowing like a river, foreign yet rhythmic.

Her heart rate picked up.

She turned her head, her vision sharpening as she took in the room around her.

And what a room it was.

High, intricately carved ceilings stretched above her, adorned with golden chandeliers that bathed everything in a warm glow. The walls were lined with deep-colored draperies, the fabrics shimmering under the torchlight. There were enormous vases filled with fragrant flowers, their scent thick in the air. The furniture was polished wood, carved with designs she couldn’t place.

But what made her breath hitch was the statue at the far end of the room.

A statue of solid gold.

‘Is that… is that a bloody f*cking GOLD statue?!’

She gawked, her mind struggling to compute.

Her gaze darted around, landing on the people standing near the statue. There were four men—strong, tall, and dressed in embroidered dhotis, their arms wrapped in cloth that draped elegantly over their torsos. They had gold ornaments on their wrists, necks, and ears, each of them exuding an aura of wealth and power. But one of them—one in particular—stood out.

He was enormous.

Muscles corded his arms, his chest broad, his stance powerful. If she didn’t know any better, she’d say he was a WWE wrestler, except there was something raw and untamed about him—like a warrior from another time.

‘What the hell is happening?!’

Her breath quickened. This… this was wrong.

She turned her head sharply, her eyes landing on the woman beside her.

Draped in an off-white saree with a modest veil covering her head, the woman looked at her with kind yet piercing eyes. She was saying something—speaking in that same unfamiliar language.

Abhijishya’s stomach clenched.

She couldn’t understand a word.

She parted her lips to speak, but her throat was too dry. She choked on her own breath, coughing violently.

The woman beside her gasped and held a glass to her lips. Cool water met her tongue, and she drank greedily, some of it dribbling down her chin.

‘Okay. Okay. Breathe. Just breathe.’

She needed to think. Needed to understand where she was. How she had gotten here.

The attack.

The struggle.

The hands tightening around her throat.

But… then what?

Her memories blurred at the edges, slipping through her grasp like sand.

She touched her neck instinctively, her fingers brushing against something rough. Leaves. There were leaves plastered to her skin with some kind of sticky paste.

Her stomach twisted. She looked down—more leaves were pressed against her arm, her injuries crudely bandaged.

‘What the f*ck—?!’

Panic clawed at her chest. She tried to rip the leaves off, but the woman beside her gently caught her wrist, shaking her head and murmuring something softly.

“I don’t understand a word you’re saying, aunty,” she muttered tiredly.

The men standing nearby exchanged glances, their expressions shifting.

The one in white dhoti—the only one who looked remotely approachable—spoke first.

“Vyadji, what is wrong with her? Why is she speaking so strangely?” Kunti asked the Rajvyd, her brows furrowed with worry.

“Rajmata, I cannot say. She should be completely fine, aside from a few healing wounds,” the healer said, pressing his palms together.

Abhijishya’s patience was thinning.

She took a deep breath and forced her voice to be steady. “Excuse me, where am I?”

The men stiffened.

The one in white dhoti turned toward the others, his eyes narrowing slightly in thought.

“Mata, it seems this devi speaks another language,” Sahadev said.

Sahadev.

That name rang in her head like an alarm bell.

No. No, she must have misheard.

Another man—tall, lean, with sharp eyes—spoke up.

“Sahadev, you read all those scriptures. Can you understand what she’s saying?” Arjun asked.

Arjun.

Her pulse spiked.

‘No. No. No. That’s not possible.’

“The scriptures are all in Sanskrit, Bhrata,” Sahadev said, shaking his head. “Apart from Magadhi, no other language is spoken in Aryavart.”

Aryavart.

A chill crept up her spine.

The large one—Bheem, her mind supplied, though she refused to acknowledge it—stepped forward, his booming voice confident.

“Let me try.”

He cleared his throat. “Naman.”

She blinked.

‘Naman? Wait… oh. Name. He’s asking my name.’

Something inside her told her to keep things simple. She forced her lips to move.

“…Abhijishya.”

The man’s entire face lit up. “Did you see that, Sahadev? I made her understand!”

The others chuckled, though one of them—the handsome one, Nakul—rolled his eyes.

“Bhratashree, she probably just told you her name because that’s the most basic way to introduce oneself,” Nakul said, crossing his arms.

Kunti smiled.

Abhijishya wasn’t smiling.

Not anymore.

The man in white dhoti stepped forward again, his voice measured. “Pranam,” he said, folding his hands.

“Pranam,” she echoed weakly.

The introductions began.

Each name.

Each title.

One by one, they fell like bricks, crushing the air from her lungs.

“Bheem.”

“Nakul.”

“Sahadev.”

“Arjun.”

And then—

“Mata Kunti.”

Her mouth ran dry. Her hands trembled.

‘No. No. No. This is a dream. A hallucination. A trick. It has to be.’

She shook her head rapidly, pressing her palms against her temples.

‘This isn’t real. This can’t be real.’

She needed to wake up.

She needed to leave.

“Where am I?” she whispered, her voice strangled.

“Hastinapur,” Arjun answered.

The world tilted.

Hastinapur.

Hastinapur.

‘No. No. F*ck no.’

She flung the covers off, the cold air biting against her bare arms as she lurched forward. Her breath came in sharp, ragged gasps as her eyes darted around, searching—desperate—for something familiar.

‘My phone. Where’s my phone?!’

Her hands scrambled frantically across the silken sheets, searching the mattress, the bedside, even the folds of the heavy fabric draped around her body. But there was nothing. No pockets. No phone. No connection to the world she knew.

Her chest tightened, her heartbeat thundering in her ears.

‘No. No, this isn’t happening. This is a dream. A very, very bad dream.’

The walls around her seemed to stretch, distorting, pressing in as her vision wavered. The towering golden chandeliers overhead cast shifting shadows across the marble floors. The scent of incense, once faint, now felt suffocatingly thick in her lungs.

She needed to leave. Now.

Shoving her trembling legs beneath her, she pushed herself up. The movement sent a sharp jolt of pain through her body, but she barely registered it. The room erupted into alarmed voices as she staggered away from the bed, her bare feet slipping against the polished floor.

"Devi!" someone called out, the voice laced with concern.

She ignored them.

A desperate, primal instinct had taken over—her body moved before her mind could process. Run. Escape. Wake up.

She barely made it three steps before her weakened legs faltered. The world swayed violently. She stumbled forward, and in that instant, she crashed into something solid.

No—someone.

A firm grip steadied her, large hands gripping her arms with surprising gentleness. The moment she looked up, her breath hitched in her throat.

The man before her was tall, regal, his posture exuding an air of composed authority. His eyes—dark, calm, calculating—studied her with quiet concern. There was something unnervingly steady about him, as though he were a pillar unmoved by any storm.

She didn’t need to ask.

She already knew who he was.

Yudhishthir.

And beside him, draped in layers of deep-hued silk, stood a woman with a strip of cloth tied over her eyes. Her expression was unreadable, but there was something about the way she held herself—something dignified, yet heavy, as though she carried the weight of a thousand burdens.

Gandhari.

The realization slammed into her like a physical force, knocking the very breath from her lungs.

A choked sound escaped her lips. Her entire body trembled as her hands balled into fists.

‘This is real. This is real. Oh, god, this is real.’

A deafening rush of noise filled her ears.

The murmuring voices. The rustle of silk. The distant clang of metal against marble. The too-sweet scent of flowers. The flickering torchlight casting shadows that danced like ghosts across the gilded walls.

It was all too much.

Too loud.

Too real.

Her breath hitched, sharp and shallow, her vision tunneling as the world spun violently around her. The golden chandeliers blurred into blinding streaks of light. The floor beneath her feet felt like shifting sand, unsteady and traitorous.

Her chest tightened—each inhale more difficult than the last.

She clawed at her throat, desperate for air that refused to come.

'Wake up. Please. Just wake up.'

Her knees buckled.

The strength drained from her limbs like water slipping through cracks. She barely registered the frantic voices around her, the hands reaching for her, the gasps of alarm.

The last thing she saw was the flickering torchlight, twisting and stretching into an abyss of darkness.

Then—nothing.