While Kush was eating Mukesh came to him…

“Hey bud… how are you enjoying the food here?”

With his mouth stuffed Kush said (muffled) “The food here is awesome. You guys sure have it good!”

Mukesh happy with the remark said “Come with me lets go meet my gang”

Kush picked up his plate from table with his food and followed Mukesh behind him.

After walking a few 10 seconds they managed to find the blue clothed gang members of his on a table. All 21 of them were sitting there on the table. He introduced them one by one, it was mix for men and women with fit bodies and who were younger in their age. Kush saw a male mermaid (merman) and he managed to spot a burly dwarf in the mix as well. He shook everybody’s hand and had casual conversation with them. Arul, the person responsible for creating the chains which were tied around the blocks, seemed fatigued but still cheerful. Apparently this was almost the end of their shift and the night shift people were about to come in.

Arul asked “What brings you here to east port?”

Kush as always didn’t find the point in hiding about himself said “I heading towards Kashi, just passing through here. I came here from Bhasmachal”

Arul said “It’s a bit out of the way for heading towards Kashi, isn’t it?”

Kashi shrugged “I got a lift from a friend, I will make my way there”

“Still… it’s a long route out of your way……” he paused pretended to think and said “Was this friend by any chance a girl?”

Kush smiled. This conversation was turning out into a conversation between high schoolers (this world doesn’t have high school), Kush was enjoying every bit of it.

They talked about idiotic things when the door opened once again and a person dressed in uniform similar to the other people only khaki in color. He was a clerk working for the port. He came in and announced “Mukesh there’s another consignment on its way, you guys need to take care of it urgently”

Mukesh heard it and said “What??? Are you a dumbass?? We just finished a consignment of 10 blocks right now. We are here only for emergency purposes, if these people have so many emergencies then they need to start planning things better” Mukesh grabbed the clerk’s collar in anger.

Santosh the clerk said “He cmon dude, I am just the messenger. What’s the use of getting aggressive with me?” he brushed off Mukesh’s hand which was grabbing his collar and continued “Raise a formal complaint. Jackass!!”

Santosh then continued “The port inspector wants you there immediately”

Mukesh wanted to punch something when he felt an arm on his shoulders. It was Arul’s. Arul knew the other gang members could likely continue, the problem was him. The exertion on him was massive every time he did something like this, hence fatigue accumulation was largest on him. He reassured Mukesh with a nod of his head, as he didn’t want him getting in trouble with port management in this competitive market. Mukesh reeled in what he was going to spit out and looked at his gang. All of them nodded with a smile on their faces.

Mukesh asked “What is the size of blocks?”

Santosh said annoyed by Mukesh’s attitude “50 m by 20m by 20m”

Mukesh let out a breath “Phew… sorry guys I think by the time we are done with six, the other shift guys will be in. Let’s soldier on till handover”

Saying so he started to head out. The clerk too left saying “Fucking illiterates, don’t even have the courtesy to apologize”

Both Mukesh and Santosh seemed to be used to these strifes against each other.

As it turns out, today was an especially hot day. Each of them downed a liter of water and made their way to stations. Kush asked Mukesh if he could see. Mukesh looked at him from top to bottom, though cloaked, Kush’s figure implied he could take care of himself. He said “You need to maintain a 50 m distance from the site of work, but you are welcome to watch.” Kush thanked him and followed them to the transporter. All of them boarded the transporter and followed the tracks to the two jetties on both sides of the first ship.

Like clockwork they followed the next step and lowered the bridge. The foreman piloted the transporter to the location and lowered the bridge. The cockpit had a window in it allowing, the pilot a direct view, the chain guy who also stood behind the pilot. Both of them could be seen from the outside as well. Once at appropriate height the chains were released and tied behind the pilot after looping around the load. After that the chain guy just had to sit back and down mana potions.

Arul’s face was pale once the chains were taking the load but he managed to complete the first block without issues. Then came the second vessel with another load and they managed to finish the loading this block as well. When the third vessel came, Arul was coughing up a lot, Mukesh failed to notice this and Arul did not inform him of the fact as well.

They successfully managed to lift the third load off the vessel. As planned, vessel started moving from below the load. Kush’s eye never left Arul’s face since the second load and he felt this was getting dangerous. When the vessel had crossed half of the load’s length, it happened...

Arul couldn’t maintain the chain and two of them holding on one side of the load snapped…

Mukesh on seeing this, did the first thing that came to his mind and started raising the bridge higher as much as possible. The speed of the bridge was limited and it was quite obviously not enough. The swing of the load was going to encompass the entire aft of the vessel. The vessel would not survive the explosion.

“Oh the horror…” was the first thought of a deck worker who was right below the swinging load, Mani. He had closed his eyes and covered his ears with his hands and crouched. But the expected collision did not come… all he heard was a bang.

A few seconds ago…

Kush whose vision was always concentrated on Arul after the second load was worried. The only reason he didn’t intervene was because he did not want undermine the workers… but then… the worst happened. The load came swinging down and Kush launched himself at it. Kush new the load on the transporter must have been 80 tons atleast, but currently his mass too, could be few 100 kgs more than 50 tons, meaning his momentum if he gave enough power could blow the piece of rock away. He could jump but making up for the speed to throw it away would be difficult, rather he was not sure if the floor would survive his jump. But things had to be done in quick 3.36 s, required for the rock to hit the first victim in its path. Kush bent his knee and let the mana emission from his body stop entirely.

“Huck…” slipped his lips, as he suddenly felt the weight of a small mountain on himself. The floor beneath his feet started cracking. If it cracked entirely he was going to sink in 20 m deep water like the rock was going to. Kush didn’t have time to think. His face instantly went red from exertion, his legs tensed up, tendons taut from being pulled to the extreme, his shin bones bent ever so slightly were going to snap if he didn’t release the stress immediately, the toes in his foot had already started to develop cracks as he had to raise his heels to jump and then…

‘BOOM’

Everybody’s view was blocked by the entire ore block, so nobody could see the hulking body of a one armed person wearing a cloak, nobody except of one that is. It was the foreman of jetty #223 who was in a position of getting the view of the entire action sequence in all its glory. He could see up close, Kush’s blood shot eyes and clenched teeth since the cloak’s hoody had come off mid jump. It was not surprising to him since he had seen his, close to 6 ft 4 in figure up close and personal, but what surprised him was what came into view when the cape part of the cloak too trailed behind his body. He could see Kush’s body in its entire magnificence and the lopped off right arm. He couldn’t figure it out earlier cause Kush’s face had no defining features, but he had recognized Kush now.

Kush used his entire weight to slam himself into the ore piece, mana ores were metallic in nature so when Kush crashed into it an ear piercing, deafening sound came

‘GONG’

The sound was so loud that some people felt even their souls had been shaken awake by the noise as they clutched their ears in pain. No one could shut their ears in time, except for the one person who was going to crash into the mana ore piece first Mani. All he heard was loud version of the same, his head started spinning but he was not bleeding.

Arul was shaken to his core for the first time when two of his chains vanished but he still managed to maintain, with extreme strain, the last two of his chains but once he heard the loud gong he too passed out and the last two chains snapped. Everybody in vicinity passed out, only Mukesh remained awake, his ears too were bleeding, but he sat through the pain just long enough to see where Kush had dropped in the water and to stop the transporter from moving up. He then fell to the floor of the cockpit and passed out.

Mani, the only person unhurt in this entire incident, opened his eyes and ears right after the sonorous sound stopped, his hearing immediately after was not perfect but he could see people dropped to the ground and the huge piece of ore still un broken lying there in a corner on the broken remains of what was once jetty #226 about 150 m from where he was. “WTF just happened here?” he thought to himself, he had shut his eyes for but a couple of seconds. He then saw other people lying on the ground with their ears bleeding. He rushed towards the vessel’s sick bay to get the first aid kit and started tending to people on the vessel first. Fortunately including the people in the transporter there should not have been more than 50 people and it seemed the loud sound had been an indirect signal for help as people and the area medical officer were rushing towards vessels and jetty #223.

Mukesh was the first one to wake up after the incident and he had a nauseating headache. As soon he lifted his head he vomited. Since he had passed out it had been less than 3 minutes. “The kid can still be saved” he said to himself as he slowly, awkwardly but consciously stumbled off the cockpit nosediving into the sea waters right below the jetty. Within a minute of him breaking water surface he came back with a wet and cloaked body of a hulking man, swam to a nearby monkey ladder where a few people came to help them up. He then fell to the ground on his back, breathing heavily trying to see if his motor functions were intact cause swimming had never been such a hassle for him. “What fuck is the weight of that axe?”

The port chief medic came to him rushing and healed him, when she saw that Mukesh had purposely put the man’s hoody back on, she did not move it. She placed a hand on Kush’s chest and after her eyes glowed ruby red, a few concentric circles started forming on Kush’s body from the point of contact of the medic’s hands to Kush’s body. She raised an eyebrow when she noticed the stump on the right arm and muscular figure. “Exactly as described” she thought, as she realized why Mukesh had chosen to not remove the cloak’s hoody from the person’s body. The circles continued forming and leaving the point of contact as Kush started coughing out water and then passed out once again.

The medic did a check-up of Mukesh and realized he too, like the other patients, was just knocked unconscious by the loud high frequency noise and the damage was not permanent. She then asked him to carry Kush to the medial bay and continued with examination of the other patients. Mukesh knew she was a reliable person and did what she asked him to do.

After reaching there he dropped Kush on a bed and plopped on the bed next to him and passed out once again.

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Half a day later

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“Nhh…” slipped Kush’s mouth as he moved on the bed. Sleepily he opened his eyes and saw the familiar cast once again on his arm and this time also on his left foot. This was the metal cast which only partially stopped the movement of joints. This was way better than when his bones shattered entirely after fighting Brutus.

He tried moving his fingers and foot and realized he had grown stronger. Stronger than when he left his island a few months ago, cause he remember how he couldn’t even stand after wearing the braces and now he jump after taking their entire weight, though he had to fight through the tremendous pain of his bones cracking, it was still an awesome amount of growth. “Speaking off… where are my braces?” he thought as he slowly raised his torso using the power of abs from lying position. He then found them piled safely right next to him on the ground.

Sensing movement from patient bay the medic rose from her seat and pushed the translucent curtains aside and saw Kush again. He was given a special bed to hide his identity hidden in a wall of curtains and by now she managed to heal all of the other people affected and sent them on their way. When Kush saw her, she was dressed only in an orange Saree no blouse, she was five feet eight, reasonably fit, wheatish complexion, beautiful eyes, small nose, red full lips and small ears. She was not an overtly voluptuous woman but her curves were perfectly placed on her thin waist. Black hair parted in the middle tied in a bun behind her head and black eyes added to the charm. She fashioned a small bindi between her thin brows.

Kush was taken by her beauty; he didn’t initiate a conversation cause he was still assessing where he was. He could recall himself falling in the water, but after that everything was blank. Considering he was not bound and chained meant that he might not have been held a prisoner and the smell of herbs and medicine would mean he was probably in a hospital. He loosened his nerves a bit.

The chief medic then said “I am Ramya, the chief medical officer of East Kutchhy Port” she said as she raised her hand in a gesture to shake Kush’s. Kush too raised his hand grabbed her petite, small hand. He felt the smooth skin on her hands and almost didn’t want to let go. Ramya realized this and smiled a little. Only then did Kush snap out of his reverie and said “I am Kush, I am new here”

Ramya then asked “Kush Samudraputra I presume?”

Kush was surprised, it was not like he was trying to hide his identity or anything, but he had yet to tell his surname to anyone yet cause Tara had warned him against revealing his surname in Bharat. She said that almost no one would be able to make the connection the way she did, but there were people who could make the connection and those people were dangerous, not the kind he would want knowing his identity

“Don’t worry, the only reason we know about you is because of your physical description and that axe” said Ramya guessing what he might be thinking.

Kush replied “How do you know all about me?”

It was Ramya’s turn to be surprised, “was he really this stupid?” she thought and then said “You do realize, you are currently one of the most famous people in the west coast right?”

It was only now he realized what she was talking about, the chronicalizers had pretty much publicized his feats of defeating Brutus by now all across the world. Though a small nation, the problem of Brutus troubling an entire nation was a known issue throughout the world and considering that ‘the incident’ had happened a little more than a month ago it was not a stretch that a person fitting his ‘unique’ physical description could be him, especially with Tanka on his back. He was wearing his parent’s cloak to hide his physique anyway.

Ramya then told him about how Mukesh saved him and how he discovered his identity

“I don’t know why you want to hide your identity but you don’t need to worry though about me and Mukesh” she said

Kush asked “Why do you say that?”

To which she replied “We along with tens of thousands of workers working here are immigrants from Bhasmachal…”

Kush’s eyes were wide open due to the revelation…