"Gremblins," Surya whispered, the word tasting familiar on his tongue. "I’ve heard that name before."

  As he looked at the girl, his mind drifted back to a quiet afternoon at the Section D Headquarters. He and Rohan had been assigned the unenviable task of dusting the archives, but Surya’s attention had quickly pivoted when he spotted Subha tucked away in a corner, buried in an ancient, leather-bound volume.

  "What are you reading, Subha?" Surya had asked, leaning over her shoulder.

  "A study on Goblins," she replied without looking up.

  Surya peered at the illustration on the yellowed page. It depicted a three-foot-tall, emerald-skinned creature with oversized, bat-like ears—almost identical to Raksha’s ears in her true form. "Is that supposed to be a Goblin? It looks a lot smaller than Raksha."

  Subha finally looked up, tapping a finger on the sketch. "It’s not a Goblin, technically. It’s a Gremblin—a subspecies."

  She pointed to a series of fine, hair-like tentacles protruding from the creature's neck. "See these? They’re neural filaments. Much like Goblins, Gremblins use these threads to latch onto a host’s brain and influence their thoughts."

  "That’s... incredibly unsettling," Surya muttered, a chill running down his spine.

  "The main difference is the cognitive capacity," Subha continued, a mischievous glint appearing in her eyes. "You see, while Goblins are notoriously sharp and calculating, Gremblins are remarkably dim-witted."

  "Is that so?"

  "Oh, absolutely," Subha teased, closing the book with a soft thud. "In fact, they’re widely considered the dumbest creatures in the Underworld. They might even give you a run for your money, Surya."

  "Hey! Watch it," Surya barked, though he couldn't hide his grin.

  Snapped back to the present, Surya strained against his bonds, his voice echoing through the eerie village square. "Hey! Are you out of your mind?" he shouted at the Gremblin girl. "We are Vessels! If anything happens to us, the others will hunt you down. They’ll wipe every last one of you out!"

  The girl didn't flinch. A villager approached her, carrying a tarnished metal spoon filled with steaming, thick gravy. With a chilling calm, she dipped her finger into the boiling liquid, licked it clean, and nodded.

  "It’s seasoned well," she murmured. "Take them."

  "Stop it! I’ll kick your little teeth in!" Surya roared, his desperation mounting.

  The girl didn’t even turn around. "You can’t do anything. You’re tied up, and since you only have a few minutes of life left... I suppose I can tell you who we are."

  She finally looked at him, her eyes vacant and cold. "We are Gremblins. No Mythic controls us, and we serve no master. Even the high lords of the Underworld know we are uncontrollable. We are the free birds of the abyss; we wear these human skins like rags just to scavenge every living soul in our path."

  "So the whole village... it’s a trap," Surya breathed, the horror sinking in. "You disguise yourselves as humans to lure people in and eat them."

  "You finally understand," the girl said, a small, twisted smile tugging at her lips. "I am their leader. They do as I command... though even I find it hard to keep their hunger in check."

  Surya watched in horror as the villagers dragged Rohan, Vaishu, and Pari toward a massive, bubbling vat of human gravy. As they moved, he caught sight of the Kartha and the other missing people. Their movements were jerky, their eyes glassy—they weren't alive. They were mere husks, their bodies possessed and piloted by the Gremblins like macabre puppets.

  Panic surged through him. Surya shut his eyes, focusing every ounce of his will. Solar energy began to hum in his veins, glowing faintly white-hot at his wrists. He pulled with all his strength, expecting the rope to sear and snap under the intense heat.

  But the rope didn't budge. The fibers seemed reinforced with a dark, damp energy that neutralized his power. No matter how much solar energy he channeled, the knots remained agonizingly tight. He was trapped.

  "I have to do something... otherwise, we’re all dead," Surya whispered to himself, his heart hammering against his ribs. "Think, Surya. Think!"

  Suddenly, his eyes snapped open, sharp and focused. "That’s it. The only way."

  As the Gremblin villagers dragged him toward the vat, the glow in his hands didn't just fade—it vanished. Instead of letting the solar energy radiate outward, he pulled it back in, forcibly shunting the current from his left arm into his right. He could feel his veins bulging as the energy pressurized.

  With a sudden, violent surge of dual strength, Surya flexed. The intense concentration of heat and pressure caused the reinforced ropes to char, melt, and finally snap like brittle twine. He lunged forward, landing a devastating punch that sent the Gremblin villagers flying backward like ragdolls.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  The Gremblin leader gasped, her cold composure finally breaking. "How? No human should have been able to break those bindings!"

  Surya stood tall, steam rising from his overheated right arm. "Tonal Shift," he growled.

  The memory flickered back to the quiet days at the bungalow. Surya was mid-training, his knuckles bruised from hammering a heavy cotton dummy. Pedro watched from the porch, a look of quiet approval on his face.

  "It seems Chandru taught you well," Pedro noted. "He has elevated your power to an entirely different level."

  Surya wiped sweat from his brow, panting. "Yeah, he taught me plenty. Mostly by making me clean his room, wash his clothes, and skipping my lunch."

  Pedro chuckled. "Every chore was a lesson, Surya. The repetitive physical labor of specific muscle groups was designed to prepare you for Tonal Shift."

  "Tonal Shift?" Surya asked, pausing his training. "What’s that?"

  "A technique of energy redistribution," Pedro explained, stepping down to the grass. "For example, if I need to outrun an opponent, I shift my entire kinetic reserve into my legs. It allows me to move at speeds far beyond the average human. I taught this to Chandru years ago. For a normal human using weapons, it’s a physical strain—but for Celestials like you, the impact is far more profound."

  Surya frowned, remembering the night of the New Moon. "Mr. Pedro, that night Chandru fought Heera... he was vulnerable because of the No-Moon Day. He fought with raw human strength and survived. Was that because of this technique?"

  Pedro nodded gravely. "He survived only because he shifted his remaining lunar energy to his hip to cauterize the internal bleeding. Once the wound was stabilized, he channeled his raw human willpower into the fight. Usually, a warrior only learns Tonal Shift after mastering the First Layer of their power... but your anatomy is unique, Surya. You might be able to skip the line."

  The Gremblins watched in stunned silence as Surya stood free. Without wasting a second, he lunged toward the villagers dragging the sedated forms of Pari, Rohan, and Vaishu. Using the concentrated solar heat in his right hand—fueled by his newfound mastery of Tonal Shift—he seared through their magical bindings as if they were dry straw.

  He shook his friends violently, but the sedative was too deep. The Gremblin villagers began to hiss, circling closer with jagged utensils and rusted blades. Surya looked at his glowing palm, then at Vaishu.

  "I’m sorry, Vaishu..." he whispered.

  He gripped her hand, letting the solar heat bite into her skin just enough to trigger a sharp pain response. Her eyes snapped open, and she let out a piercing scream. "Uh! It’s hot! It’s burning!"

  Surya quickly released Vaishu’s hand, his face flushing deep red.

  “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! It was the only way to shock your system awake!”

  He repeated the desperate process with Pari and Rohan. The room, previously silent and deathly still, was suddenly filled with sharp curses and startled shouts as the two men bolted upright.

  “Surya, you absolute idiot! That hurts like hell!” Rohan yelled, clutching his scorched wrist and blowing on the reddened skin.

  “Have some respect, Rohan! I just saved us from becoming a side dish!” Surya shot back, his adrenaline still pumping.

  Vaishu rubbed her wrist, her eyes darting around the dim room. “Why are we tied here?” Her gaze then landed on the massive stone bowl she had seen earlier, now perched over a roaring fire. “That bowl… are they cooking a meal for us?”

  “No,” Surya replied grimly, pointing toward the window where the villagers had gathered. “They are cooking us.”

  Pari stood up, shaking off the lingering mental fog from the sedation. He flexed his fingers, testing his reflexes, then looked at Surya with newfound respect.

  “Thanks, Surya… but how did you figure this out? How did you manage to bypass the sedative?”

  “The principle of sensory override,” Surya explained, lowering his voice while keeping an eye on the door. “Chandru used to do something similar—he’d wake me up by splashing boiling water on my face during training. I figured a sudden, intense sensation would wake us. So I used my burning hands to create pain sharp enough to send an emergency signal to your brains, forcing you awake regardless of the drugs.”

  Pari looked at the faint brand on his hand, then back at Surya.

  “You did a good job, Surya. I’d tell you it was a great job if you hadn’t branded me like a piece of cattle—but I suppose I’ll settle for being alive.”

  The Gremblin boss let out a guttural growl that shook the walls. "Enough! Attack them! Tear their skin for the gravy!"

  The "smiling" villagers charged, their faces twisting into monstrous, green-skinned visages as their human illusions finally shattered.

  "Do you need a Stasis field, Pari?" Rohan asked.

  "Not required," Pari replied, his voice cold and precise. "They are sluggish."

  In a blur of motion, Pari activated his retractable gauntlet blades. He moved like a ghost through the crowd, his strikes surgical. Every time a blade flashed, a Gremblin fell. Surya followed suit, landing heavy, solar-enhanced punches that sent creatures flying into the walls, but he couldn't keep up with Pari's efficiency.

  For every one Gremblin Surya took down, Pari had already silenced eight.

  Surya watched in awe as Pari danced between the attackers, his movements fueled by an unnatural speed. "Pari... I’m starting to doubt you. Are you really a Norman?"

  "Born and bred," Pari replied, parrying a rusted cleaver and counter-stabbing in one fluid motion.

  Surya realized then—Pari was using the same strategy Guru Pedro had described. He was shifting his energy with such precision that he was outclassing the mythics in their own territory.

  With the combined force of Firefist Surya’s raw power and Mantisman Pari’s lethal speed, the "Village of Smiles" was quickly becoming a graveyard for Gremblins.

  Surya stood amidst the fallen husks of the possessed villagers, his glowing right fist smoking as he pointed directly at the Gremblin boss. "It’s over," he declared, his voice echoing in the sudden silence of the lodge. "Your soldiers are down. There’s nowhere left for you to hide."

  The Gremblin girl didn't cower. Instead, she began to laugh—a heavy, rhythmic sound that distorted her small frame. Her mouth expanded unnaturally wide, unhinging like a serpent’s jaw, and she let out a piercing shriek in that same gravelly, ancient voice: "SWARM!"

  The response was instantaneous and horrific. The "villagers" Pari had sliced down didn't stay dead. Instead, the human skin of the corpses began to heave and tear from the inside. From the chest cavity of a single human body, three Gremblins—small, wiry, and wet with dark fluids—clawed their way out.

  Vaishu watched in sheer disgust as hundreds of these emerald-skinned creatures flooded the room. But they weren't attacking. They were leaping toward their leader.

  As each Gremblin collided with the boss, they didn't just touch her; they merged. Flesh fused with flesh, and bone knitted into bone. With every merger, the girl’s body expanded, her human disguise shredding away like wet paper.

  When the transformation finally stilled, the "smiling village" was gone. In its place stood a single, towering nightmare—a fifteen-foot-tall Gremblin Giant. Its skin was a patchwork of mossy green hide, and dozens of eyes flickered across its massive head, each representing a consciousness lost to the swarm.

  Surya and Pari looked up at the towering monstrosity, their weapons appearing like toothpicks against its massive, tree-trunk limbs.

  Rohan took a shaky step back, his hands trembling as he looked at the ruins of the village. "What have we done?" he whispered.