At the foot of a towering mountain, Ashura and Jasmin stood side by side, the wind playing with their hair. Ashura looked at her with an inspecting gaze and said in a calm voice that hid a storm behind it: "It is time... little one."
Jasmin rubbed her hands nervously and said in a shaky voice: "I was excited a moment ago... but now, I feel something like nausea from anxiety."
Ashura let out a short chuckle: "No need for that... you realize full well who your teacher is, don't you?"
Jasmin nodded slowly: "Alright."
Ashura took a step closer and extended his large hand to grab her head, placing his thumb with light pressure on the center of her forehead. He closed his eyes for a moment and whispered: "Have you detached your mind from your body as I told you?"
Jasmin closed her eyes tightly, trying to focus, but answered hesitantly: "I don't know... I don't think so."
Ashura whispered to himself: As I expected... her Mind Core is still dormant in a deep sleep. No matter... I will awaken it in my own way. A wicked smile formed on his lips, and he said aloud: "No problem... I will help you."
Suddenly, he pressed his thumb forcefully, and a torrent of dark purple energy flowed from his hand directly into her head. It wasn't just pain; it was as if a nail of fire was piercing her skull. Jasmin let out a booming shriek and fell to her knees, clutching her head with both hands, while Ashura continued to laugh, looking down at her.
Jasmin shrieked with tears in her eyes: "What are you doing, you madman?! My head almost exploded!"
Ashura stopped laughing and looked at her coldly, saying: "You are still alive... and screaming. This is good."
Jasmin stood up angrily, swaying slightly: "What is your problem with killing me? If you don't want me as your companion, I will leave!"
Ashura approached her and leaned down until his face was opposite hers, saying in a serious and sharp tone: "Fool! You haven't understood yet... suffering is not a punishment, but rather it is 'construction.' Every ordeal either strengthens you or breaks you, and the difference lies in your response to the pain. Look at yourself now, little one... don't you feel it? Your Mind Core... it is finally pulsing, so that you may realize the most important lesson: that what does not kill you... makes you stronger."
Jasmin froze and felt her head. The headache had vanished, replaced by a strange feeling of clarity and a warm energy flowing through her veins. She said in a hesitant voice: "What did you do? I didn't do anything..."
Ashura smiled a wide smile, his eyes gleaming with curiosity: "I have given you a valuable gift... I planted a burst of my own 'Mind Core' inside your mind. I broke the barrier by force." Then he added, stroking his chin: "It is interesting... to see how a human body will react to the energy of the 'Lord of Destruction'."
Jasmin’s eyes widened in shock: "Wait! What does this mean?"
Ashura approached closer and whispered in a voice carrying a terrifying promise: "This means... that you have inherited one of my abilities, little one."
Ashura stepped back two paces and opened his arms as if offering her the whole world, saying in a voice full of pride and arrogance: "Gravity... is the master of natural laws. It is the hidden hand that holds the planets, and it is the shackle that prevents mountains from flying. He who controls it... controls the weight of existence itself."
He pointed his hand toward a medium-sized rock a few meters away and said in a commanding tone: "That rock... do not go to it. Make it come to you."
Jasmin looked at the rock, then at her trembling hands: "How... how do I do that?"
Ashura exhaled in boredom and said sharply: "Do not think like a weak human. The energy I planted in you is not for bargaining. Gravity does not ask for permission; gravity imposes its will. Imagine an invisible thread connecting your Mind Core to that rock... then pull all of existence toward you."
Jasmin closed her eyes and tried to sense the new energy. It was like trying to tame a raging beast inside her head. She felt the purple pulse moving from her mind, flowing through her veins to reach the palm of her extended hand.
Ashura whispered in a voice like a hiss beside her ear: "Do not hesitate... pull it!"
Jasmin opened her eyes and shrieked as she pulled her hand muscles back as if she were grabbing a heavy imaginary rope. The rock shook in its place, and dust rose around it.
Ashura shouted: "Stronger! You are not pleading with the rock, you are commanding it to submit!"
Jasmin gritted her teeth, and her eyes glowed with a faint purple spark for the first time. "Move!" she shrieked with power. Suddenly, the rock broke free from the Earth's gravity and launched with frantic speed toward Jasmin like a projectile.
Jasmin gasped in terror, but before the rock could strike her face, Ashura stopped it with his bare hand in the air, inches from her nose. The rock crumbled into dust at his mere touch.
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Jasmin coughed, waving her hand to clear the dust, her heart pounding hard. Ashura said as he coldly brushed the dust from his shoulder: "Violent... and unrefined. But it is an acceptable beginning. You used 'Attraction.' Remember this feeling, the feeling of being the center of the universe where everything gravitates toward you."
Jasmin sat on the ground panting, trying to grasp the terrifying power that had just surged through her body. She raised her head to wipe the sweat from her forehead, and as she looked toward the distant horizon to catch her breath, something strange caught her attention.
She narrowed her eyes, trying to focus amidst the scattered clouds. There, in the middle of the sky, very far away... something was floating. It wasn't a bird, and it wasn't a cloud. It was a glowing point of dark purple, similar to the color of the energy she had just used, but it was stationary, pulsing with a slow and terrifying rhythm, as if it were an eye watching the world from above.
Jasmin stood up slowly and pointed her trembling finger toward the sky, saying in a faint voice: "Ashura... what is that thing?"
Ashura looked with boredom to where she was pointing and said in a flat tone as if addressing a child imagining things: "What, little one? It’s the sky... have you become afraid of clouds now? Focus on your rock."
Jasmin fixed her gaze toward the sky and extended both her hands, shouting with stubbornness and defiance: "I will bring it here!" She unleashed every atom of gravity energy Ashura had planted in her. A purple halo exploded around her body, and the ground cracked beneath her feet from the intensity of the pressure. She was pulling something invisible with all her strength, the veins in her neck protruding from the effort, but... the thing above did not budge. It was heavy, so heavy that the bones in her arms nearly shattered.
She took a step back, panting, and looked at Ashura with wide eyes full of confusion: "Ashura... there is something I cannot pull! It’s... it’s as steady as a mountain!"
Ashura looked with boredom to where she was pointing and said in a flat tone: "What, little one? Are you unable to pull a cloud?... What a disappointment."
He stepped forward slowly and stood behind her, then lazily extended his right hand to grab the void beside her trembling hand and said mockingly: "Let me see what this thing is that 'you cannot pull'."
The moment Ashura closed his fist on the gravity path Jasmin had created, the mockery vanished from his face immediately. He narrowed his eyes, feeling that massive weight... a weight that could not belong to a cloud or a bird. He smiled a savage smile and said in a low, terrifying voice: "Whoa... this isn't a cloud... good choice... I didn't sense it because my senses were focused on the ground."
Ashura suddenly shouted and pulled his arm with a mighty force toward the ground, as if he were uprooting the sky itself: "If it won't come voluntarily... I shall pull it by force!"
"BOOM!" The clouds above were instantly torn apart. The small point suddenly transformed into a massive ball of fire. It wasn't just a rock; it was a flaming comet, responding to Ashura’s power and rushing toward them with a speed that burned the atmosphere, leaving behind a trail of smoke and destruction.
Jasmin shrieked in terror as she saw the mass of hell heading toward them: "It’s too huge!... It will kill us all!"
Ashura exploded into a mad, hysterical laugh, his voice louder than the roar of the comet. He clapped his hands slowly as he looked at the disaster he had pulled down with his own hand and said in a tone dripping with insanity: "Hahahaha! This is the true catch!"
Ashura's laughter stopped suddenly, replaced by a terrifying calm, heavier than gravity itself. He did not run, and he did not blink. He stood with a straight back, walking slowly against the direction of the stormy winds caused by the comet.
He said in a calm, deep voice, clearly audible amidst the noise: "Reality of the Soul... Foundation of Destruction."
He began to advance with calm and confident steps toward the falling comet, as if going to receive a guest, not to face a disaster. He turned half his face toward the terrified Jasmin and said coldly: "Witness... the power of Destruction."
He raised his right hand in a lightning-fast motion, as if striking the air with his claws. "Storm Blades."
Invisible ripples of compressed air, sharp as guillotine blades, launched from his hand, slicing the sky with a deafening whistle. In a single moment, the giant comet stopped in its tracks, then began to disintegrate. The massive rock split into thousands of small pieces, cut with terrifying precision before it could touch the ground.
But Ashura was not finished. He raised his left hand toward the sky, and massive electrical energy, dark purple in color, gathered in his palm. "Thunder of Annihilation."
A bolt of lightning exploded from his hand, branching in the sky like a giant spiderweb, striking every rock fragment scattered from the comet. He didn't just shatter them; he atomized them and turned them into atomic dust in fractions of a second.
The comet vanished, the rocks vanished, and nothing remained but a thin cloud of ash slowly falling over the quiet desert, with Ashura standing in its midst, untouched by a single speck of dust.
Ashura laughed ecstatically: "What a thrill it is to challenge nature itself!"
Jasmin was looking at him in daze, whispering: "What just happened?"
Ashura turned to her with a deadly calm: "Be proud, little one, that you possess a trace of the power of the Lord of Destruction!"
Jasmin remained standing in her place for a moment, her eyes fixed on the empty sky, a smile still etched on her face from the shock and triumph. But suddenly... the thread snapped.
She felt as if a mountain had fallen on her shoulders all at once. The air vanished from her lungs, replaced by a burning gasp. She coughed violently, and drops of bright red blood splattered on the golden sands.
She raised her trembling hand slowly to touch her face, only to find hot blood bleeding profusely from her nose and ears. The world began to spin around her, and her vision of Ashura blurred until he became just a long shadow.
"A... su... ra..." she whispered in a choked voice, before her legs completely failed her. She fell to her knees first, then her whole body slumped onto the sand, losing consciousness completely, as if every atom of energy in her small human body had burned away to perform that single miracle.
Ashura walked slowly toward her small, motionless body. He looked at her coldly, but deep in his eyes, a faint glimmer of appreciation sparkled. He said in a calm voice while looking at the blood on the sand: "The human body... a fragile vessel for energy of this magnitude. You pulled a disaster from the sky, and your body paid the price."
He leaned down and carried her on his arm easily as if she were a feather, then whispered as he continued his way through the desert: "Sleep now... for the pain you feel is the proof of your new birth."