They had arrived in the city and were heading to the royal palace.
"ah... where am I?"
Aariv looked and saw the painter guy waking up. He had healed his nose so that shouldn't be a problem.
The painter guy looked around and then stared at Aariv's face for a while,
"It's you...and" He then looked down.
"My clothes... what did you..."
"Shut the hell up pervert," Aariv said irritatingly.
"You're the one who is perverted, you forced me into your carriage and..." before he could say anything he heard his own voice and a magical scene.
"You naughty boy..." Aariv played the recording on the holocom and showed it to the guy.
"See this... it's you who jumped on me" he said pointing at the hologram.
"Wha... what sorcery is this.... and it was probably because I got drunk"
"Dunk?... you just had a small peg... it was just 50ml," Aariv retorted and threw the shirt at him.
"Get dressed, we are about to reach the royal palace," the man embarrassingly put on his shirt, forgetting about hologram.
"wait... royal palace?... wh... who are you?" he scaredly asked.
"I am Aariv Maurya, the first prince of Mauryan empire," he said.
Painter guy's jaw dropped to the floor and then suddenly prostrated on the floor of the carriage and touched Aariv's shoes.
"Please forgive me, your highness, I... I have a little sister to take care of if something happened to her then..." he said while weeping. It was genuine fear. who wouldn't fear after doing that to someone with such a high status.
Aariv grabbed the collar of the guy, picked him up and threw him on his seat.
"I haven't decided to kill you yet. I asked you to enter my carriage because I was interested in your drawings in the first place... we will continue our talk later, for now you are going to be my luggage picker"
The 100 guards were rerouted to another resthouse while Aariv's carriage was escorted by the palace guards. Although the Mauryan Empire and Kalinga had animosity but still they had to welcome Aariv with the best of their ability.
The majestic carriage entered the palace and stopped in front of the gate, Mauryan ambassador was there to receive him with some servants. There were people from Kalinga royal family too but they kept their distance.
People continuously chattered seeing the Carriage, the ambassador went forward and opened the gate. Aariv majestically stepped out of it. People were in awe, seeing his dress. He looked quite handsome; all the females present had their hearts skip a beat.
Even the ambassador was mesmerized by his looks.
"Your highness, welcome," He said with a bow.
Aariv nodded and stepped forward. The servants welcomed him by throwing flower petals on him. Surupa timidly got out and picked Aariv's luggage.
~Hmm, the army should have started to march towards here. I just hope that they can clear out all the possible spies.~ He thought he had ordered the army to only move at night and follow an offroad path. It was hard but not impossible.
He estimated that it would take at least 5 days for them to come and in 5 days, it was the marriage ceremony, according to the star positions and the horoscopes of the bride and groom, it was decided that the ceremony would take place at 9 in the night. In the meantime he decided to sightsee. He was also interested in knowing who the bride was.
...
5 days later,
He was staying in a guesthouse, just beside the royal palace. He had already caught 8 assassins until now. Right now he was talking to Black on his holocom.
"Where are you? Today is the wedding day; the ceremony will start in the night." He asked impatiently.
"Your highness, I think we'll reach before midnight," Black said.
"I hope you do," Aariv said and hung up the call.
Aariv didn't value the Kalinga royal family but he valued the people. He couldn't kill the king and expect the people and the army to surrender. He needed to make the people hate their king so that he could come and act as the savior.
His plan was simple. Due to such a big marriage taking place, most of the ration was bought by the palace, leaving very little for the public. They had also imposed a rule that the people could only buy rations in a small amount.
Currently, people didn't have much food in their homes. Aariv had sent his men dressed as traders, they bought nearly all of the rations left in the city at a high price and sent them out of the city after that he was going to close all entrances of the city.
People would eventually get hungry in some days, then Aariv would fire his catapults and destroy the city wall but still he was not going to attack.
He would then send his men to spread hoaxes that the King wants to use the civilians as his shields against the enemy, that would enrage the populace and start a riot with a small spark from Aariv.
Many different kinds of wedding ceremonies were going on in the palace. Nearly all of Kalinga's important people were gathered there. He was now going to a ceremony to see who the bride was.
He reached a big hall which was heavily decorated with flowers. Some musicians were playing Tabla(small drum-like instrument played with tapping finger and palm).
He looked at the Bride seated behind a curtain. She was wearing a Ghungat(A scarf covering her face) so he couldn't see her face. But he did notice her father.
He went near the old man and greeted him.
"Forgive me for my ignorance but I didn't recognize you," Aariv said respectfully.
The old man saw Aariv and made a disgusted face and proudly said,
"I am the king of Cholas, Purusaprabhu Chola. I'm busy so go somewhere else kid" He scoffed at Aariv.
When Aariv heard the name his eyes sparkled.
~Fu*king jackpot. Now I won't have to make a new plan for taking over Chola. The sheep came to the lion herself.~ He happily thought and ignored the Chola king.
Chola was a big kingdom in south India and Aariv's next target. They were known for their gold. Aariv also knew about the world's second deepest mine in the world was also situated there. It wasn't heavily mined until 1876. The British found it and mined it. It is estimated that more than 1,000,000 kilos of gold is in there. It was closed by the Indian government in the 21st century due to mining hazards. The mine was called Kolar gold fields or KGF.
Aariv was going to use advanced tools to mine it. So he was sure that he'd be able to go deeper.
Currently the south India was ruled by 3 families. Cholas, Cheras and Pandyas. Aariv was going to attack Chola first and then the others. His main problem was that these 3 kingdoms were too far away and it would have taken a long time to reach there.
Now he was just going to hold the King and the soon to be widowed princess, hostage. Further planning still needs to be done.
Aariv smilingly went out. It was time to prepare for the night.
...
8:00 PM that night.
The main ceremony had begun. The priest had started to chant the mantras. The venue was the terrace of the palace. It was the highest point in the city so you could see quite far from there. Aariv was bored, waiting for the his army to arrive and the city wall's bugles and drums to sound.
He covertly sent Black a text message.
"when?"
"We are very near your highness, the city guards will probably be able to see us in 15 minutes"
"Okay, when you reach, stand in the formation far enough that the city palace is within range of the catapults. Also seal the 3 exits of the city, if anyone goes out then use archers."
"It will be done, your highness"
They concluded their chat. Aariv looked at the center of the crowd at the Kalinga king smilingly. King Anantha felt someone looking at him and looked at the Aariv, he felt chills seeing him smile at him but he ignored and focused on the ceremony.
...
On the border wall.
Soldiers were on guard. The city gates had been closed for the day and the bridges over the moat were closed too.
In the guard tower, 2 soldiers were talking to each other.
"Man I wish I was on palace duty" Soldier 1.
"Yeah, we could have eaten good food then" Soldier 2.
*Sigh*
"But we're stuck here," Soldier 1.
[BUGLE SOUND]
Someone started the alarm from the other watchtower.
The 2 soldiers got alerted and looked around for the reason for the alarm. Then they saw a huge army heading their way. Elephants, horses, foot soldiers. They estimated that the army contained at least 300,000 men.
"God damn it, start the war drums" Solder 2 shouted and both of them went to a big drum and started beating it with sticks.
At 8:30 PM the sound of Drums started reverberating in the whole city. People woke up from their sleep and the people in the royal palace got up from the ceremony and came to the edge of the terrace to look at what was happening.