The air inside the royal armory turned cold.
Not the cold of wind or rain, but something deeper—something dead.
The creature's broken mask lay in pieces around it, but it was not finished. Its body began to pulse, dark matter shifting like oil over flame. Its limbs lengthened. Its spine cracked, reshaped. Where there had once been form, now there was chaos.
Bahubali stepped back, blade still raised.
"What is it doing?" Aravan asked, voice tight with dread.
Kattappa stood frozen. "It's becoming what it truly is."
The shadow beast shrieked, a sound no human throat could mimic. Its mouth split wider than any animal's, its limbs twisting in unnatural angles. The room trembled. Stones split. The beast was no longer flesh, no longer shadow.
It was hunger made visible.
Devasena shouted, "Fall back!"
Too late.
The creature lashed out. A wave of force knocked warriors through columns. One archer screamed as the thing wrapped a tendril of darkness around his chest and crushed him in a blink.
Bahubali charged again, this time without hesitation.
He struck low, aiming for the joints—but the blade passed through, like slashing mist. The beast laughed. Not aloud. In his mind.
A voice echoed inside Bahubali's skull.
"You can't kill what has no soul."
He gritted his teeth, fought against the noise, and slashed again. Kattappa joined him, swinging his axe, their weapons meeting resistance now. The creature was solidifying—but stronger, faster, crueler.
Aravan circled behind, knives in both hands.
"Now!" Bahubali called.
They attacked in unison.
A blade to the leg.
An axe to the spine.
A knife to the throat.
The creature roared, wounded but not broken. It whipped around, slamming Kattappa into a wall, knocking Aravan down, barely alive.
Bahubali caught him before he hit the stone.
"Stay with me, brother."
Aravan coughed blood. "You must… end it."
Suddenly, the storm outside cracked open the palace dome. Rain fell in torrents, and lightning flashed across the floor. Bahubali turned toward the broken roof, the storm answering his call again.
He stood under the lightning, sword raised high.
"Come then!" he roared. "Come and fight me!"
The beast lunged.
Bahubali dropped to one knee and drove his blade into the soaked stone. Lightning surged down the steel.
It struck the blade.
Then the beast.
The explosion sent everything shaking. Walls collapsed. The throne room behind them crumbled. Flames shot from the cracks in the ground.
The beast screamed.
Its form writhed in light, bones exposed, muscles splitting.
And still it lived.
Barely.
It dragged itself back, half its face gone, skin scorched and twitching.
Bahubali collapsed beside Aravan, exhausted, rain soaking his bloodied armor.
Devasena arrived, helping them up. "We have to go now. It's not over. It's never over with this thing."
Kattappa stood behind her, armor dented, his voice like iron. "Then we don't run. We finish what we started."
Bahubali looked up at him, breath ragged. "Together?"
Kattappa nodded.
"Together."
The Final Moments of the Night
The creature fled into the broken halls of Mahishmati, leaving blood and shadow in its wake.
But something had changed.
It bled.
It feared.
And it knew now—Bahubali could kill it.
The sky finally cleared, moonlight cutting through the smoke and ruin.
Bahubali stood at the gates of the palace, looking out at the battlefield.
Behind him stood Kattappa, Devasena, Aravan—barely upright but unbroken.
"They thought we would die here," Bahubali said quietly.
Devasena placed a hand on his shoulder. "Let them come. We'll greet them with fire."
Kattappa raised his sword.
"For Mahishmati."
And beneath the rubble, the beast waited.
Watching.
Wounded.
Changing.