Next-Day: Morning

Aariv had made a new uniform for his little outings and Juno's powers made it much easier to make things. He just needed to bring her the materials and she would make whatever he asked. Yes, it wasn't easy making her work but after some nagging and arguments she agreed.

He was currently wearing a plain white shirt and black pants, on top of that, he was wearing a black leather trench coat. (Join Discord to see reference photo for the coat) and he also wore dark brown leather boots. He knew what he was doing was unnecessary but still, style mattered so, yeah.

Aariv had also picked up a long sword from the armory and it looked a bit funny on Aariv because the long sword was 4 feet long and Aariv himself was 4.4 feet tall. He took it because it was the most good looking and strongest sword in there. It also had a nice golden cross handle and a good shiny sharp blade and another factor was that he knew he was physically very strong so he needed a sword that could handle his strength. He had put the sword in a holster on his back.

Aariv looked at himself in the mirror and nodded smilingly "Yep, badass".

"Huh, Narcissistic fool," Juno commented. She was definitely not happy being interrupted while watching her shows and made to work.

Aariv's eye twitched "Oh, I thought you went back to watching your shows. Does this mean you were peeping at me?" Aariv said cheekily.

"WHAA... No..wh..why would I peep at you... ahhhh" She was clearly flustered.

"haha... Okay, let's go now" He went out of his room.

Aariv started walking towards his father's office to tell him that he was going out and he also wanted to know when he was planning the siege of Saurashtra kingdom.

After 1 minute of walking, he reached the office. He saw 2 guards standing at the door.

"Your highness, His majesty is not here. He went to check the military practice." one of the guards said.

Aariv retracted his steps. He looked at the guard for a second, trying to remember his name "Oh, thank you for telling me Parth" he said smilingly to the guard named Parth.

Unable to meet his father, he decided to go tell his mother.

When he entered the king's bedroom he saw his mother feeding porridge to Bindusara.

Durdhara looked at the room's entrance warmly and said: "Very good timing Aariv, come have some breakfast."

Aariv looked at his little brother's face which clearly showed that the porridge was not tasty. "No thanks mom, I have already eaten"

He went near the bed, put aside his sword and sat near Bindusara and ruffled his hair. Bindusara, who was enjoying it, said. "Big brother, your clothes look so cool, please make me one too"

He looked at Aariv with sparkling eyes. "haha... Okay, I'll make a set for you after I return."

"Are you going somewhere?" His mother asked.

"Yes, I am going to the northern jungles to get some stuff," he answered.

"Are you going alone?" she asked worriedly, to which Aariv nodded.

"No, I won't allow it. Take some soldiers with you, It could be dangerous out there"

Her worry was understandable as she had never experienced how physically powerful Aariv was, To her, he just had some non-physical powers.

Aariv looked around for ways to prove his strength and finally picked up the empty metal glass. In the current era, refining and processing ways were very crude so metal glasses weighed much heavier and were much thicker than modern times.

Aariv first handed the glass to his mother. "Mom, try to use all your strength to squeeze that glass and change its shape.

She looked at her son first, trying to get a clue on what he was trying to do, then she did what he asked. She used all her strength with both her hands to squeeze the metal glass but no matter what she did, it did not change. After some time her face started to turn red but she was still not giving up.

"Stop...Stop, MOM!, give that glass to me" he said, trying to get the glass out of her hands.

"haa...haa...haa, it's so hard to squeeze," she said while panting.

"It's okay mom, no normal human can do it, Maybe father could but only because he trained for so many years." He tried to cheer her up.

"Okay, now look at me try," Aariv said.

He held the glass in his left hand and started putting some pressure on it, soon he had squeezed the glass without sweating a drop.

His mother was dumbfounded, she knew firsthand how strong the glass was. But to her surprise, Aariv did not stop there.

Aariv squeezed it more and the glass stopped looking like a glass. It had turned into a dumbbell shape. then Aariv finally used his other hand but to just move the position of the glass. He kept on squeezing and changing position and soon he had a perfect round metal ball in his hand.

Durdhara's jaw had dropped to the floor by that time, She had no idea that he was so strong. "Son, when did you get so strong?" She asked with a surprised expression.

"Since the beginning mom," He replied and passed the metal ball to her.

Aariv looked her in the eye and asked: "So now is it okay if I go alone?"

She stopped fidgeting with the metal ball and looked up. "Okay but you have to be careful okay"

She still looked worried.

"Yes mom, I promise I'll be careful" looking at her still worried face he chose not to tell her about going to the siege with his father in the coming days.

...

After coming out of King's bedroom he made his way to Kautilya's office because he needed his identity token and the map of the jungle.

Aariv entered the office without knocking, "Hay, Ba..."

He saw the assistants in the room so he stopped mid-sentence.

When the assistants looked at the person who barged in without knocking, they stood up and bowed.

"Your Majesty"

"Your Majesty"

Aariv just nodded to them and continued walking to Kautilya's desk. "Acharya(Acharya is a prefix used to address a highly learned person) I am going out, I need my identity token and the map"

Kautilya knew that he would come so he had already prepared all his things. He opened the drawer and picked some stuff from it.

"This is your Identity coin, It is proof that you are the first prince and it will allow you access to any place in the empire," Kautilya said as he put a coin with 3 inch(7.62 cm) diameter on the table. It had a lion's face on 1 side and Chandragupta's(emperor) face on the other, the number '2' was also carved on it.

"What does number 2 mean," he asked.

"Number 2 means you, number 1 is queen's and number 3 is Bindusara's," Chanakya explained.

"And this is a map of the northern area but please don't go too deep into the jungle as it's still unexplored region and the map is also unmarked and also beware of the poachers," he said as he handed the map to Aariv.

~It looks like I'm gonna have to hunt some poachers while I am at it~ Aariv thought to himself.

"What about the bags I asked you for?" Aariv asked.

"Oh, they are already loaded on your horse. You just need to go to the Royal stables. Also, take this pouch with you," Kautilya said as he handed him a pouch full of gold and silver panas.

Aariv took the stuff and put them in his pockets. He turned and walked out, and when he was passing the assistants desks he waved his hand and said "(in Spanish) 'Adios' boys"

They had no idea what Aariv said and just bowed to him and looked at his funny walking figure. A 4-foot long sword on a 4.4-foot tall body.

Kautilya just shook his head and started writing something on the paper.

...

Aariv was in a very good mood today, he cheerfully walked towards the royal stables while humming. The stable was at the backside of the royal palace. He went there and looked for the caretaker.

...

The caretaker was a man from a poor family, he belonged to the Shudra caste(farmers and peasants) originally, he had never thought that he would be given the job of mending to the horses in the royal stables because he belonged to the lower caste but one day when he was going home after buying rations he saw an out of control horse wrecking havoc, he was very good with the horses and always felt like he could talk to them since he was small.

He saw the pain in the eyes of that horse so he decided to approach it, after a lot of work he finally got the hold of its bridle.

He stroked its head and brought his mouth near its ears and started speaking to it, to calm down. The crowd was really shocked when the horse really calmed down. He then saw one of its legs not touching the ground so he held it up to check. He found a nail piercing its heel. He removed the nail and brought the horse back under control.

What he didn't know was that the emperor was passing by and saw the whole scene and got impressed. In the end, he was offered a job in the royal stables with a very good salary.

But still, everything was not nice, he got discriminated against here by all the other caretakers because they were from higher caste, they were paid 8 silver panas while he was paid only 5. He had no friends, but he was happy as long as he was near horses.

...

Aariv just entered the stable and he saw a guy talking to a black horse while stroking its hair with a brush, he initially thought that the guy was nuts but when he saw the horse nodding its head in response he was amazed.

He tried to listen to what he was saying to the horse, "Shakti, you are going to be his highness the first prince's steed from now on, you must follow his commands. I've heard that he is a very righteous person so I am sure that he will treat you nicely." The man said to the horse,

The horse nodded but then suddenly its ears stood up, turned its face and looked at Aariv. The man also turned his face and looked at Aariv.

Aariv's was left speechless looking at the pair.

"Your highness, your steed is ready. Everything you asked for has been loaded," the caretaker said while bowing, not looking at Aariv's face.

"Look, you are so ugly that he doesn't even wanna look at your face," Juno commented, like her usual toxic nature.

Aariv's eye twitched, he looked at the caretaker and said. "Stand straight and look at me, I don't bite I promise"

His words brought a smile on the caretaker's face as he stood straight.

"Tell me, what is your name?" Aariv asked.

"It's Ketu Ramdas, your highness" He replied timidly, his smile vanished.

Aariv noticed his timidity, he looked around and saw other caretakers looking at Ketu with jealousy and hatred. Then it struck him, he searched for the surname Ramdas in his memory and found that it belonged to the Shudra caste.

He concluded that because it was nearly impossible for someone of lower caste to receive a job in the royal palace but still, there he was, working. Hence, Ketu must've been bullied a lot by those cunts.

"Tell me Ketu, can you talk to horses?" Aariv asked smilingly.

*Sigh* Ketu was getting nervous when he saw the prince quiet for a moment but when he saw him smiling his worries vanished.

Ketu hesitated at first but in the end, told him the truth.

"Yes, your highness. But I just speak normally, it's them who understand me," he said while happily stroking the horse.

"That's so awesome. All right then, from now on you are my permanent horse caretaker," Aariv said loudly.

"How much do you get paid?" Aariv asked as he brought out his money pouch.

Ketu was flustered with sudden announcement and the question.

"5 silver panas per month, your highness" he answered hastily.

"Okay from today onwards your salary will be 10 silver panas per month and here is your joining bonus" Aariv took out a gold pana from his pouch and gave it to Ketu.

Ketu's jaw dropped with the sudden change of events. his salary was already very high. 3 silver panas were enough to feed a family of 4 for a month and now his salary was increased to 10 panas plus the gold pana which was equal to 100 panas.

To be honest he had never seen a gold pana up so close till now. only big merchants had them.

Actually, Aariv had no idea about the monetary value of the currency in the current era. These things were not written in any history book so he knew nothing. He just gave away the first coin he touched in his pouch.

Aariv then went close to his horse with black shining fur and a golden saddle. He jumped on its back but he remembered something and looked at the still flustered Ketu.

"YOU ARE MY PERSON FROM NOW ON AND IF ANYONE TROUBLES YOU THEN I'LL HAVE THEIR HEADS ON MY SWORD," Aariv said in a thunderous voice, looking at all other people.

Everyone in the stable except Ketu trembled when they heard those words, many fell as their knees got wobbly.

"HA!" Aariv waved the bridle of the horse and took off.

Ketu just stood there looking at Aariv's vanishing figure in the distance. He felt this good and relaxed for the first time since he came to work there.

...

Meanwhile, on horseback.

"I was so badass back there, right Juno?" Aariv said smugly.

"What?... did something happen?... I was busy watching Naruto," she replied uninterestingly.

"Whose Naru... Ah.. forget it" He replied and silently rode his horse on the old town road.