is Manar?
Book One: The Where Twin Star
Chapter 16: The Birth of Stars
—
[Behind the Barrier]
The wolves performed their war dance, forming a human-beast circle with Dajja and Munaf at its center — locked in an existential battle with killing as its only purpose. The scent of fierce breath mixed with scattered blood. Retreat wasn't an option. In the law of instinct, retreat meant instant death.
The two opponents stood like mountains, towering at nearly three meters tall. Here, all martial arts and flashy techniques fell away. Claws and fangs knew only the language of tearing. The battle raged until dust flew twenty meters high with every thunderous blow.
Suddenly, tattoos began growing on their bodies — ancient totems glowing with light like hellfire itself. The speed of their strikes increased until both fighters became shadows clashing viciously behind a wall of dust.
In a fleeting moment, Munaf's defense wavered. Dajja seized the opening and unleashed a terrifying howl that deafened for miles, paralyzing Munaf for fractions of a second. That was all Dajja needed. He struck like lightning, sank his fangs into his opponent's neck, then twisted his body in the air with tremendous force — tearing the head from the body and throwing it to the ground with cold finality.
Then something momentous happened. Munaf's tattoos began transforming into words, coursing across his body like living creatures, until they settled above his heart. Emma tried to step forward, but the werewolf pack mobilized instantly, their glowing totems emerging as a final warning.
Dajja gasped, catching his breath, tattoos covering his body: "Do you intend to desecrate our sacred rituals, Emma? Know that we will fight to the death. We won't retreat a single step before you!"
Emma replied with biting sarcasm, turning away: "Tsk... Just a light snack, not worth the effort. Don't worry, pup. The contract still stands until dawn." She turned and left with unnerving coldness.
As she withdrew, Dajja returned to his human form and approached the lifeless corpse. He placed his hand on Munaf's chest. The magical words transferred from the dead body to his hand, tracing their way up his arm and shoulder until they merged with his own totem above his heart — the tattoo growing larger as new letters emerged, whispering added power.
Dajja kicked the corpse contemptuously and spat on it: "Dirty traitor... Put him in the car trunk. We'll return him to the tribe so the shaman can complete the rituals." Then he turned toward the transparent barrier, watching the horizon where Maytham had disappeared, whispering words swallowed by silence.
—
After the pack regrouped, they surged forward again — toward where clashes had erupted between all factions fighting over the artifact. Everyone against everyone. No real alliances except within the same group.
The earth trembled under the weight of war.
Kilometers from the Temple of Ninmakh, the fronts had merged. Sorcerers hurling balls of black fire. Transcended transforming into masses of savage rage. Dajja's wolves roaring and pouncing on anyone who approached.
Dajja was at the heart of it.
He transformed into his giant wolf form — three and a half meters tall, claws tearing bodies like paper, eyes glowing with infernal yellow light. He ripped apart a sorcerer who tried to approach.
Siraj held the left flank alone, transforming and reverting with incredible speed, confusing the sorcerers with his unpredictable movements.
Emma wasn't fighting.
She stood on a small hill, away from the battle, watching. Her black eyes followed every movement, every fall, every drop of blood.
She was searching for something. Something that hadn't moved yet.
—
[Two Kilometers Away — A Sand Dune]
Tick tock... Tick tock... Tick tock.
The sound of the lighter was Ahmed's only companion in this hell.
He lay on his stomach behind a sand dune, focused on the battle. Beside him, Gigi appeared and disappeared with every sound of the lighter — sometimes to his left, sometimes to his right, sometimes above his head.
"How many are there? I can't count," Ahmed whispered.
Gigi appeared behind him suddenly, laughing her rattling laugh: "Gigi gigi gigi... Many, child. So many. Sorcerers from seven tribes. Transcended from many fronts. And totemic tribes... They're a happy crowd."
"Does the winner get a prize?"
"Maybe yes, maybe no. But you know what's most fun here? Gigi gigi gigi."
"We didn't forget the sunflower seeds this time?" Ahmed pulled out a paper bag and started shelling seeds, throwing the husks to the ground — they burned and turned to ash.
"Gigi gigi gigi. Good. But there's something else. Someone has tampered with the threads of fate. I see fire flowing against the current." She stopped moving suddenly. Looked at the horizon.
"So we'll ruin the plans like always, right? Double the fun?"
"If we want to ruin the plan, we'll need to move with all our strength — or it won't be fun anymore." Gigi spoke with unusual seriousness.
"Why? Doesn't he like playing?" Ahmed's enthusiasm dimmed.
"No, child. He loves games more than anyone. Gigi gigi gigi."
"Who is he? Let's go play with him." Ahmed went back to eating seeds.
"Shh. His name isn't spoken. Unless you want his attention."
—
Silence inside the temple was heavier than bearable, broken only by distant muffled explosions and stray bullets — as if the outside world was collapsing in an endless death party.
Suddenly, the soil at the bottom of the well split open. A trembling hand emerged, followed by another clinging to the rock. Then Maytham's head appeared. The first thing he did was spit out a mouthful of black dirt and cough violently until his lungs nearly came out.
Maytham climbed out of the well — not with the dignity of heroes, but coughing up three-thousand-year-old Babylonian dust.
"Damn..." he whispered hoarsely, wiping his mouth. "This dirt tastes exactly like Sami's socks." He dragged his exhausted body out and shivered. Not from cold — from the shock of existence.
He raised his hand to wipe his face — and froze. He felt his chin. That wasn't the light stubble he'd left hours ago. It was coarse and thick, and his hair now touched his shoulders in chaotic waves.
"What is this? Did I sleep there for years?" He smiled bitterly at imaginary mirrors. "Damn, Maytham... Your handsomeness just got filthier. Sami will think I ran off with a wandering singer and spent my life on the road."
He looked at his body. The bulletproof vest was shattered. His shirt was a tattered rag. But strangest of all was his thigh wound — the bullet that had pierced him before entering the well had stopped bleeding, leaving an old scar, as if injured years ago, not hours.
He moved until he exited the empty temple, now returned to its stillness. He looked left and right frantically, eyes stalking the shadows. He began crawling like a ghost among the scattered corpses within the temple boundaries.
He passed by a soldier's body, leaned down, and pulled a cigarette pack from the upper pocket. He shook it — full. "I'll borrow these from you. Given everything that happened, I'd usually mock you — but I can't mock the dead." He muttered and continued searching the soldier's pockets, finding a metal lighter.
Maytham continued. He picked up an M4 from the ground, glanced at a body beside him: "Your pants are nice, but they don't suit my Parisian taste... I'll settle for the bullets." He leaned over and pulled a magazine from its pouch. "By the way — that wasn't mockery. The pants were clean. I wasn't mocking you. Goodbye."
He kept walking, mentally noting: next time, pack spare pants. I swear.
—
Maytham moved with heavy steps, dragging a body that had grown imaginary years during a few treacherous Babylonian hours. There was an inner feeling — a hidden compass in his marrow — guiding him away from the clamor of death on the battlefield. In his daze, Maytham didn't notice that he'd passed more than once before armed soldiers without being seen. He passed like a fleeting thought, never settling in anyone's memory.
In his subconscious, one idea pulsed — a magnetic pulse distilling all the horrors he'd seen in that cursed well: "You are bound by a contract."
What contract? What did it stipulate? He didn't know. All he knew was that his feet were no longer his own.
He crossed beyond the transparent barrier, leaving the raging battlefield behind without looking back. He didn't see the black mist wrapping him like a shroud woven from the fabric of night. Nor the book floating beside him like a silent guardian — the entity guiding his steps toward the unknown. Maytham thought he was just a lucky rat escaping, while the truth was that all of Babylon trembled behind him; because the cover of a new book had begun its journey.
—
[On the Sand Dune]
Ahmed was still shelling sunflower seeds with annoying boredom.
"Come on, child. Let's go. The game's over. Gigi gigi gigi." Gigi's voice called from the void beside him.
Ahmed wiped the dust off his backside, getting up reluctantly: "Is it really over? But they're still fighting like madmen out there."
"Yes... It's over." Gigi watched the stars, her eyes clouded with a strange blue glow.
Tick.
The sound of the lighter was the last thing heard in that place. With the ignition of blue flame, Ahmed and Gigi vanished — leaving only smoldering seed husks and the echo of Gigi's laugh, carried away by the desert wind.
—
[The Battlefield — Funeral Silence]
At that moment, the earth trembled beneath the feet of Transcended and sorcerers. Then most of them stopped fighting — as if an electric current had been cut from their bodies. The screams subsided. The fireballs faded into the darkness of night. A terrifying funeral silence descended. The professionals here didn't fight for honor — they fought for the prize. And the prize had left their custody.
"Let's withdraw, you bastards!" Dajja roared at his pack in a hoarse voice, feeling a sudden coldness in his personal brand. He turned to Emma, who was still watching the horizon in a strange combat stance — as if smelling something no one else could.
Emma raised her head to the sky. Saw the blue star being born from the womb of darkness.
"It seems she's been freed..." she whispered coldly.
Suddenly, her body began disintegrating — transforming into a massive swarm of black insects that launched toward the desert, vanishing in seconds, leaving behind an ominous emptiness.
None of those present were fools. They knew from their sources, from the cold pulse in the battlefield, that what they'd come for was gone with the wind. No need for empty fighting that would earn the victor nothing but bullets and dust.
Maytham was now in the heart of the desert. Alone with the book he couldn't see, under the gaze of the blue star.
— End of Chapter 16 —
— End of Book One —
—
Author's Afterword
Hello, everyone.
Completing the first book was a new and enjoyable experience for me, and I hope you enjoyed it too. My idea for the first book was just an introduction to the Where is Manar? series. I don't know if this will remain the novel's title — I've thought of many others.
As you may have noticed, the early chapters differ from the later ones. I started writing this novel over four years ago, but it wasn't a serious project back then — just scribbles. Each chapter took two months or more. My literary sense was rough at the time. But I didn't want to change the early chapters, because they were the reason I started writing this novel in the first place.
In the end, the story is still at its beginning. Consider the first book a prologue. I wish you an engaging read in the parts to come.