《The Destiny Eclipsed》Ch 6 Dangerous Encounter
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5th September of the year, Chennai.
Time flew by, one month passed since the discussion with his brothers.
This month was by far the most hectic one since Hari's retirement. He had to look after Auction House all day long, creating something from scratch proved a lot more complicated.
Thanks to Rakesh's connections in this line of trade, they found an upright veteran Appraisal Master and crafty yet trustworthy auctioneer.
Anil was in charge of the office and making preparations for their Inaugural Auction.
The triplet did a great job in acquiring an old abandoned Museum in the suburban parts of the city; actually, it was quite a bargain given its size and artistic designs.
They spent around 13 million rupees on buying this property its remote location was the only drawback. Further, a large scale renovation took place; Hari and his brothers spent another 7 million for this project.
On the whole, 20 Million Rupees was expended by them just for the building, but every penny was worth it; they need such a grandeur structure for a large scale success.
Today was a busy day like any other day, after a long tiring day, Hari walked out of the office on the first level to his motorbike parked by the lawn.
Once he got on the bike, he spent a few minutes appreciating the beautiful building.
They had used special night gems to decorate the walls and pillars which glittered in the moonlight, making it seem like an ethereal palace from heavens.
Then he rode his bike home, these days he was spending lesser and lesser time at the house. It's been three days since his last visit, actually Shemo was the only person who would miss him.
On his way back, he passed through an empty avenue. There Hari got a glimpse of a man sneaking into a house to his right-side.
Hari couldn't just ignore but neither could he just jump into action without confirming whether it was a burglar or a prankster.
While Hari was pondering, the man who sneaked was intently stared from a covert position at the old man sitting on a couch with a cup of coffee and a thick book.
A few minutes later, Hari decided to intervene, and he slipped to the house through the backdoor and entered the main hall.
The man was had sneaked in earlier was taking cover by the refrigerator, he noiselessly pulled out a poisonous dart and steadied the breath before aiming.
The dart was shot in one seamless motion, though it seemed effortless the power it contained was unfathomable.
*siisisss*
Exactly at the instant, Hari entered the room, a bolt of black lightning zoomed past him to the old man's neck.
*Thud*
And the book in his hands fell as the old man's head hung down; a thin stream of blood gushed out from a small hole in his neck.
Unfortunately, Hari was one step late; to his right, an old man was found dead with wide-open horrid filled eyes were staring at the Black Dart in his hands which he had pulled out before his death.
To his left, a bald man in the white shirt was staring dead straight at Hari. Those eyes didn't have an ounce of fear or anxiety in them, he was just standing there like a stone pillar.
The bald guy was exhibiting extreme pressure; much similar to his brothers but strangely his stance was full of holes.
After a few minutes of silence, the man sent a creepy smile before charging forward without any hesitation; Hari was dumbstruck by that guy's reckless manoeuvre.
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No fighter would wildly run towards an enemy with such a sloppy open move.
But one has to give him credits he was swift, he reached Hari in a matter of seconds and launched a punch packed with power; which was nonchalantly dodged by a hair-thin margin.
Instantly, Hari knew the guy before was totally out of his league; he was just too strong for him. Though it seemed to be an easy dodge, in reality, Hari had to exercise utter caution as he knew if anyone of the punch were to connect, then it would be disastrous.
After a few minutes of reckless punching, the man was still going at it like a raging bull; if anything his punches were growing stronger and stronger.
Hari's only hope is cash in his hefty fighting experience against this bulldozer.
Till now none of the punches connected, everything was hit on thin air as Hari dodged, but each blow slashed through the air creating shockwaves.
Hari knew things were going south for him; he was expending too much of mental energy to avoid the attacks. His eyes started to search for loopholes and weakness, suddenly he discovered a strange phenomenon.
Though with every punch, the power was increasing, he was also losing his mind with every passing second; he was losing his rationality slowly. One word to describe his situation would be 'Berserk'.
Instantly, Hari's brain went into Hyper mode and formulated a plan to stop this human bulldozer.
At this moment the bald guy was like a wild raging bull, he's completely immersed in the battle that he even ignored his surroundings.
Hari led him to the main door while dodging the punches, if he were even a bit sane, he would have noticed something amiss, fortunately for Hari anger had completely clouded his brains.
A few minutes later, Hari was backed to the wall; he stood right before the Main electricity circuit board of the house and as expected the kid didn't think twice before sending another punch at Hari.
Unlike the earlier strikes this punch connected, Hari took the blow to his right shoulder to
deflect the assault of the Circuit Board.
*Ahhhh…*
The human bulldozer directly punched into to Circuit board, leaving a vast hole and tangled wires in its place.
*Thud*
As planned the big guy collapsed on the floor like a sack of potatoes, but the last strike dislocated Hari's right shoulder and fracture few bones.
With inhuman strength by his side, severe electrocution would only send him into a temporary coma lasting a couple of hours.
Thus Hari was running short if time, he quickly found a thick rope tied the big guy, left the house with a dead body in the hall.
With a dislocated shoulder and ticking time-bomb like a bulldozer; Hari couldn't take any risks. He didn't take the pains to dispose of the corpse, instead parcelled him in a large gunny bag and carried him to his motorbike.
Hari took 20 minutes to reach their Auction house and threw a meat bag in the hall.
*Thud*
The sound alerted all his brothers, they all rushed to the hall.
"Sushani make him speak, and Riya take a look at my right shoulder, something's broken."
Hari asked Riya their medic to fix his arms; she immediately went to Hari and tore his sleeves to inspect the injury.
Once she touched his shoulder, her eyes suddenly sharpened and unintentionally murderous aura leaked from her. Instantly the air became heavier, and everyone wore a solemn face;
Anil still couldn't make head or tail.
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But others knew, Riya's change indicated the strike was severe and could have possibly killed Hari.
Rak single-handedly picked up the gunny bag and carried the unconscious fella to the cellar below. In Rak's hands, the big Gunny bag was almost like a normal back-bag.
Sushani followed Rak to the cellar as Riya, and the rest stayed in the hall tending to Hari's injuries.
A couple of hours later…..
In the conference round table, all the brothers have gathered around with grave faces, the information Sushani gathered were just too unimaginable.
"Hey replay the videos, let's see if we could make something of it."
Anil suggested, in fact, he's the only person with a stable mind among this group. The rest of the group, including Hari, were thunder-struck.
Sushani looked around before playing the video once again, as others inched to edge of their seats.
A few seconds later, the video played. In front of the camera, a mutilated bloody human figure was tied to the wooden chair.
He kept on mumbling… "Kill me, kill me, ….. please kill me."
One could only fathom the torture he has been through from his terrifying fresh wounds and burns. He certainly in a state 'Life worse than Death', unsurprisingly this is the teen Hari bought.
"Who are you?"
An emotionless cold, eerie voice resounded, the guy was waiting for this question.
"Thank you, thank you….." the mutilated human opened his vacant eyes before starting.
"I'm Yash Hydre. Young Master of Hydre clan, Gyru city; during an expedition I offended 'Tyrant King'. Though I was a promising talent in the city, it's nothing before the magnificence of 'Tyrant King's stardom.
That ruthless fellow wiped out my clan and crippled my brain, making it not so easy to use. But he even went a step further to banish me to the World of Mortals."
Though it was a short, everyone present could feel the overwhelming sadness and bitterness bottled. Still, none of the brothers sympathized with him, rather everyone watching the video were utterly confused and clueless.
"Where is your city exactly located?"
Once again the same eerie voice resounded, but this time it had a hint of perplexity.
"My city is in… is in… Ori Realm… Ahhhh"
All of a sudden, all his orifices bleed and his eye opened wide while pupil shrunk; a figure rushed to him and tried emergency treatment only in vain.
"He's dead."
A short declaration in the same indifferent eerie voice and the figure turned around. It was Sushani, she was the one who tortured Yash to pull out some answers.
And the video ended with a black screen an irritable silence prevailed.
"Maybe that guy was lying?"
Anil could only give a stupid suggestion to break the suffocating silence.
"It's impossible, Sushani is Expert Interrogator; she's the best or one of the best in this field. So no one can deceive her, certainly not this dumb brute."
Hari answered without turning his head, and Anil had a sudden flash of inspiration.
"That's it, he wasn't deceiving anyone, he was just telling the truth; his truth. The one he believes to be true, I'm certain that he's delusional or has some sort of mental ailment."
Anil raises his voice in excitement but was shot down once again.
"He was neither delusional nor mentally ill; his pupil movements were steady, his pulse was normal and I couldn't discern any other symptoms of mental instability. The most baffling thing is his mysterious death, it's unreasonable."
Riya shot down Anil's assumption with facts and all the others nodded; while Anil was speechless.
'how could you guys be so shameless; it's already a miracle that he didn't die of that inhumane torture and you have the gals label it as unreasonable death.'
Anil mentally criticized his brothers for being so thick-skinned. Actually, Anil threw up when he first saw this video, he just couldn't stomach the violence.
"There's undoubtedly some issue with this guy; he moment he uttered the word 'Ori Realm' he mysteriously died.
The only logical conclusion this clue leads us is that the fella named Yash had some sort of mechanism which will be triggered if he utters these characters; which is totally illogical.
Furthermore, he didn't hesitate before uttering 'Ori Realm' which means he didn't know about the mechanism.
Instead, he would have committed suicide long ago by uttering these words instead of going through the painful torture for more than an hour.
Moreover, his death itself is a mystery; even Riya couldn't identify the cause for heart rupture or brain failure. A more intriguing point is that even post-mortem didn't yield any clue about the mysterious mechanism."
Priya substantiated the point of focus to give everyone a clear picture.
*sigh*
"I think contacting the teacher is the only way, he'll certainly know something about this guy and Ori realm."
Then he placed a triangle pod on the table, it was a state-of-art holographic projector; a digital flower girl popped from the pod, literally a loli with lily head.
[Welcome, Ex-Soldier Hariharasudan.]
It was a cold yet cute voice, no emotion could be traced, but a strange flavour of charm was just bizarre to hear.
"Lily connect to Jagor Lion."
Hari ordered Lily's Indian Military Artificial Intelligence.
[Request processing….. Authentication….Authorization……Connecting to Marshal Jagor Lion.]
Soon Lily vanished, an old man in Dark Blue robe appeared, his face was full of wrinkles, and his hair was completely white. Only one word could describe him 'Old', he was so old that he's almost ancient.
"Hari it's been a while. How have you been? What are kids up to now."
Like a caring father, the old man enquired Hari's well-being; he's Hari's mentor Jagor Lion, the head of the Indian Army. Hari's face blossomed with a smile brimming, he nodded his head quickly while everyone followed his lead.
Just when Old Marshal noticed a new face among them, Hari drew his attention.
"Teacher, please look see this video." Hari solemnly stated before switching on the laptop.
The old Marshal was totally unfazed by the bloody scenes, once the videos ended, he tied his hands back and vacantly looked into the screen.
*sigh*
"Why are they so irresponsible, treating the earth like some wasteland; idiots."
Though the Old Marshal mumbled Hari and others could easily hear it; then he turned around and wrinkled his brows looking at Hari.
The Old Marshal made some strange hand signs. Then he moved towards them and walked out of the hologram.
Hari's eyes nearly fell off; he has never seen such a magic trick. Though the old Marshal was still illusory, he suddenly seemed to have a life; it was like talking to the person in person.
"How did you.. break out.." Hari's tongues were tied in shock.
"Why should I break out, it's not a prison. Lad are you sick?"
The old Marshal answered with a puzzled face, intentional teasing his student a bit out of habit.
*SIGH*
"Brat you're still the same dumbo didn't 2 years of idling enlighten you even a bit. Huh…. Seems you had a fortuitous encounter; what happened?"
The old Marshal criticized while carefully scanning Hari though he was in some sort of astral form. He intentionally avoided anything about the Yash and the mystery swirling him.
"Sir...er…What are you talking about."
Hari asked as he looked at his teacher full of confusion.
"You're rapidly recovering haven't you realized it yet, there's some strange energy in your system mending all your internal injuries.
Look at your shoulder, don't you feel it's a tremendous recovery given that it's only been a couple of hours.
By next month all the injuries and internal damages would be mended; you would make a complete recovery."
Marshal Jagor spoke as he scanned as though he saw through Hari's body.
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