Beyond the Divine Door
The wind had died. Loret leaned against the entrance to the shadowy passage, hardly standing, every muscle tensed with tense fear. The air was uncomfortably warm—not the warmth of flame or deep soil, but much older. It was like the residual breath of something divine.
Before him, the passage yawned wide, a torn scar in the cliff. A few meters ahead, he could see nothing but the darkness enshrouding all.
Not a lack of light—this was a darkness so deep it consumed thought itself.
He lingered.
His stomach screamed two things simultaneously: go on, or kill here. Neither was appealing, but there was no option three. Behind him was only snow, wind, cliffs—death in all directions.
His eyes went back to the dark. Only that… and a decision.
Gasping for breath, he cursed, "In seven months, I'm dead anyway. If this is what I searched for…"
With trembling fingers, he unfastened the oxygen tank from his back and set it carefully on the cold stone beside him. The hiss of escaping air whispered into the passage, like the final sigh of a life already gone. "In seven months, I'm dead anyway," he repeated more quietly. "So… let's see what kind of miracle this really is."
From the pouch attached to his waist, he extracted a compact tool kit, reaching for his flashlight. The tactical light was one he had used strictly on camping excursions.
Click.
A shaft of light cut through the blackness. Dust billowed along the beam like tormented ghosts. The old stone walls appeared in brief glimpses, chilly and worn to a polish in some places, rough in others. He moved forward, boots thudding softly, the echoes running after one another down the passage in a forlorn cadence.
The farther he walked, the warmer the air grew—not warm, merely no longer the sharp cold of the mountain. It was as if the stone itself were exhaling around him. Thick silence lay in wait, each step fueling the odd feeling the mountain was breathing him in.
Minutes crept by like hours. Then the tunnel opened wide.
He stood stock-still.
It was not a wall.
It was a door.
No… a monument.
Twenty meters tall, cut into the mountain itself, the double doors were inscribed with delicate, twisting symbols that pulsed softly—each heartbeat perfectly in time.
Loret moved closer, hardly willing to breathe. His light ran over the carvings: great battlefields, star-crowded skies, and creatures coming from worlds above the stars—celestial, alien, lovely, and fearful.
Far above, a single row of Sanskrit glowed like a recollection drawn from another existence.
His heart thudded, each strike resonant in his ears. Lips moving on autopilot, he followed the ancient syllables with his voice, slow and respectful.
"Beyond the door… new path."
He scowled, grumbling to himself. "New path where?"
The flickering torchlight traced lower, cascading across a sequence of carved panels underneath the inscription. They were shards of history trapped in stone—mid-breath panels frozen in time.
The first depicted seven massive armies, each commanded by a gargantuan figure attired in curious, elaborate armor. Behind them marched lesser hosts—some human, others fashioned into forms no man had ever known.
The second panel indicated only the seven, bound in savage conflict. The small armies had disappeared. Six fought hard and the seventh stood apart, observing with an inscrutable stare.
The third indicated four armies remaining. Three having won, and one still observing. Two had already perished, their likenesses chiseled so that scarlet appeared to ooze from the stone—as though ages' blood still bled through the fissures. Two soon were left.
The fourth panel depicted the two forces in a silent conflict. No noise, yet the brutality existed in the curves of their actions.
The fifth panel… not like the others. Fourteen robed figures stood in a group—tall, beautiful, and otherworldly. Their gowns flowed with an otherworldly life even in stone. Each was clearly female, their loveliness captured by a sculptor's hand that had obviously loved them.
Loret's brow furrowed. His mouth opened. "What the hell am I seeing?"
He moved forward, as though the air itself drew him. Across from the gigantic door, something protruded from the wall—a pedestal of slick stone. On top of it sat a single inscription, unmarred by the centuries.
The closer he got, the faint shimmer of the air around him. The carved letters were Sanskrit, but as his eyes traced each swoop and curve, the transition wasn't in the letters—it was in his mind. The significance flowered in him, as if the words themselves had sunk deep into his mind and spoken their truth. His chest caught, his voice shaking as he spoke the words. They were still Sanskrit, but he was grasping them with crystal clarity.
They were talking about a war—not of gods as men had thought, but of the real makers of things. Seven ancient beings, travelers of the cosmos, had lost their way millions of years ago and stumbled upon a barren, ugly, round stone floating in space. This dead sphere was their canvas. They fashioned it, transformed it, brought life to it—not as gods, but as reality makers.
For a while, their work flourished. The initial life sprouted up, and the Seven, contented, set off for home. Before they left, they molded creatures unlike those they had ever created before—not as powerful as they themselves were, but certainly not bland. These creatures were blessed with ability and charged with the responsibility to look after the world. They would come to be called gods and goddesses. These new protectors governed in harmony for millions of years, until discontent caused them to abandon Earth and roam the universe.
But the Earth fought against their absence. As soon as their divine energy pulled away, the world started to crumble. Mountains cracked, seas expired, and vegetation shriveled. Desperate, the gods and goddesses came back, but the reality dawned on them—Earth required their presence to be held intact. They couldn't remain eternally, so they opted to leave a piece of themselves behind.
Not warriors. Not males. Male gods' power was too unstable—too destructive, too likely to cause chaos. So they left the Earth to their goddesses, whose power was a balanced combination of violence and kindness, stability and transformation. But the Earth required more than a few of them to survive. So, then, a trial was announced—a war among goddesses of all pantheons. The most powerful would inherit the combined strength of their family, a sacrifice to save the planet.
The wars ravaged the Earth, breaking and reshaping it. There were only fourteen left—each the best of her civilization. Greek, Norse, Japanese, Egyptian, Chinese, and even one angelic person from outside all religions.
Gaia. Aphrodite. Nyx. Persephone. Hera.
Frigg. Skadi.
Amaterasu. Izanami.
Isis. Hathor.
Xi Wangmu. Nuwa.
Sofia.
The names echoed in Loret's mind like thunder in the distance.
When the decision was made, all of the other gods left. Mankind would go on to confuse this as the crash of a meteor, but really it was the failure of divine return. The gods that had set out to discover the stars died in a battle too much for even they to endure. The goddesses remaining on the planet sensed this loss immediately—their collective divine nature informed them of the truth. Trapped in this world, they were unable to escape. They found, as time passed, an even greater truth: that this Earth was not the real world but only an illusion, a shadow.
For thousands of years, they maintained the balance, directing mortal life. But ennui consumed them, the gradual deterioration of eternity. And then one day, a stranger arrived—a being not born of this false world.
Noticing the irregularity, the goddesses attacked. The fight was intense, yet the stranger was not anything they had encountered. He defeated even the most powerful of them, and many were injured. As the goddesses asked him why he had attacked them, the traveler merely replied, "I am not your enemy."
Their suspicion grew more fiercely. "Then why attack us?" one of them demanded.
The traveler's eyes scanned them. "To see your strength. And I have. You are agitated. You want to know the true world."
The words hit like a still storm. "How do you know this?" one of them questioned.
Because one day, when this world is ending, a man will arrive seeking new life," the traveler replied, his voice heavy with prophecy. "He will be the key to your freedom. and your soul mate. All of you.
The goddesses exchanged startled glances, a ripple of shock passing through them. Yet before they could speak, he offered no further explanation. "Until then, you will sleep. When the destined one arrives, you will awaken."
With those last words, his shape melted into the air, and no noise remained behind. Trapped by the unnatural conviction his voice held, they complied. Each one by each, they let their awareness slide into the quiet of centuries.
A strange wanderer had visited them once, carrying a gift beyond comprehension. His farewell words offered that when the one destined searched not for them, but for the spark of life itself, their wait would finally be over. And thus they slept, locked in the massive door, resting in timeless silence until fate would awaken them.
The carvings concluded with a letter—nothing resembling the ancient script that surrounded it. This was intimate, almost gentle in its humanity.
Test and you stay on—pass, and go on. Die, and your position was never set.
Loret blinked, his lips parched. A shiver coursed through him, not due to cold, but due to the bizarre heaviness at his chest.
They had slept for him. Behind this door. Waiting.
And now… he was there.
He stood motionless, the magnitude of it all wrapping around him like a snake. The torch he held trembled, shadows dancing on the wall as his mind spun.
"What the fuck…" he muttered, voice low and shaking. "What kind of goddamn fairy tale is this?"
At the bottom of the door, another inscription caught his attention—deeper cut than the others. As his beam outlined its curves, he realized it was not another tale, but a poem. This one was alive, as if written for him and him alone.
He narrowed his eyes, lips tracing as he read aloud:
"Dvārāṁ svapnasya, śānti-gatānām
Chaturdaśa devyaḥ śayānāḥ prabudhyantām
Yadi daivaṁ mama nāma likhitam asti
Atra aham — dvāraṁ udghāṭayāmi."
The air itself grew quiet.
And then, involuntarily, the meaning spread in his head—each word throbbing with power from the ages:
O door of dreams, where silence keeps,
Fourteen goddesses lie in sacred sleep.
If fate has cut my name in flame,
Then I—The Chosen—now say:
Open.
The final word left his mouth, and the world shifted.
A low hum shuddered beneath his feet. The stone quivered. Then—
KR-KRRRRR-KRAAAK.
The doors creaked like titans awakening from a thousand-year sleep.
RUMMMBBBLLLE.
The deep, age-old rumble shook through the chamber, causing the stone under his feet to tremble. The double doors rattled once—twice—before creaking apart with a jarring CRRRRRRKKKKKK, the sound of bone crushing under intolerable pressure. Through the crackling gap, a trickle of stone dust seeped down in slow, gossamer strands. Then the light—golden and warm—flowed in through the expanding breach like the dawn of the first sun after an eon-long winter.
Loret winced, throwing an arm over his eyes. The light wasn't just bright—it was alive, almost, and filled the chill air with a queer heat that seeped deeper than skin. His heartbeat pounded in his ears, and for one moment, the world outside that doorway seemed impossibly distant and unbearably near all at once.
From somewhere deep inside that secret place—beyond the imposing gates—he sensed it. A presence. No… not one. Many. Silent, unseen, but each breathless second weighed the pressure of their eyes, as if they'd been waiting for him and him alone.
He stepped forward—not with bravery, but because the way behind him did not exist anymore.