Lotus Palace
At King's Court, along with the king, a few ministers and yashoda were present and all of them were waiting for someone's arrival. Suddenly, a guard at the entrance announced the arrival of Ashmita along with her team.
After a few seconds Ashmita entered the courtroom. She was wearing a navy blue uniform with the logo of the lotus kingdom on her left side of the shirt and her aura is powerful making no one dares to approach her and she is looking like a perfect soldier who was born to save her kingdom.
Ashmita stood before the king and with a bow she said, " Greetings! Your Majesty!! The mission is completed".
King Chanukya was very happy about the news and he announced, "You've all done a great job and saved our people from grave danger. In this happy moment I am going to reward you with 1000 gold coins to everyone and I invite you please join the dinner tonight in the royal palace to celebrate your victory"
After the king's announcement, everyone slightly bowed to him and collectively said, "Thank you, Your Majesty!"
King nodded and said, "Now everyone can leave and take some rest".
Everyone nodded and left the court.
Ashmita's team consists of 5 members. Karthik Sena, Shilpa, Veda, Vijay Sekhar and Pratap Varma. These 5 members were all orphans and each of them learned every skill along with Ashmita from their childhood. The King especially picked these 5 as kids and trained them along with Ashmitha. So now, they are the best team and each of them filled with faith in every other person which leads them to their victory in every assignment
Karthik is known for his skills with knives and his analysis is always accurate. He can use a knife in most peculiar ways which makes him tough for enemies to crack. He keeps calm most of the time.
Shilpa is known for her proficiency in Archery. She is best at it and can aim her arrow in every possible direction. She can shoot one arrow a second with utmost accuracy. She is a beautiful girl with a great sense of humour.
Vijay is an expert at wielding the sword. He wins every battle there is. He treats his blade as one of his limbs. Vijay always has an eye for nature's beauty. He is the most talkative and easy going in the group.
Pratap mastered laying the traps like punji sticks, bamboo whip traps, snake pits, and everything else. His camouflage techniques make him untraceable during a fight. He's got a lot of patience and is an innocent childlike person.
Veda is well known for her medicine skills. She knows the medicinal values of every herb available in the kingdom. She is the medic in the team. She is curious about whatever she sees.
The team of 6 share a special bond among them and are warm to each other. But they are the most ruthless and terrifying assassins that the crime world has ever witnessed. They are popularly known as "Devil's Team".
King's Chamber
In the evening, the team along with Ashmita came to the king's chamber. Yashoda also joined them later with a tray full of snacks and juices.
Due to their love for food, Pratap and Ashmita started eating without any care for others.
"Here.. Ash.. have this sweet, it is too good... yummm...", Pratap said while eating.
"Thanks kid... here.. take this juice made by yashu ma.. I'm sure you'll thirst for more!", Ashmita said, handing it over to pratap.
"Thanks.. But hey, don't call me a kid.. I am a grown up man now", Pratap pointing to his own face.
"Haha! There's nothing on your face.. Come on, accept you're a kid.. Let me ask you something.. If on this table, there is a glass of milk and a glass of wine, which one will you pick?"
By listening to this question, everyone helplessly shakes their heads because they all knew his answer already.
"That's a stupid question! You know I love milk..You don't need to ask me that, I choose milk!!" Pratap said proudly.
Ashmita smiled and called a maid standing nearby and asked, "Mister, tell me, do you have children?" and when the maid nodded, she again said "Your children drink milk or wine?"
Maid said politely "Milk. Madam".
"Thank you.. You can go now", Ashmita said and turned towards Pratap who had question marks visible on his head. She shook her head and said, "Now tell me.. Who drinks milk, you little kid..?"
"Hey.. this is cheating, maybe the maid is scared of you? Yashu ma you need to help me here", Pratap looked innocently towards yashoda. Pratap is very fond of milk from his childhood and everyone teases him for that but he never cares for their teases and he can easily get fooled for milk. And sometimes he even does other's chores when bribed with milk.
Yashoda smiled and tried to say something but Ashmita replied, "What did you just say? I scared him?? That's impossible. Everybody knows that I am just a beautiful innocent girl..!" blinking her eyes innocently.
Everyone rolled their eyes at her acting.
Before they start another bickering, "Okay.. Now I asked your presence here to discuss something important with you all.." the king said with seriousness.
Everyone got silent and looked at the king with attention.
"I am giving you another assignment'', the king said while looking at everyone. Everyone just nodded and listened as he continued..
"This time the assignment is a bit complicated one," King said.
"What is the task grandpa?" Ash asked curiously.
"Do you know Maya Village?" the king asked.
"Yes!! The one which is located in the south part of our kingdom and also famous for agriculture. This is the village which supplies abundant food materials throughout the kingdom in every season" Kartik said.
"That's correct!", the king said, "This time we got a message from that village requesting for our help" he added.
"The problem is, 1/4 th of their crop is getting stolen recently. But it is not by humans as per what the villagers are saying", the king said with some unknown fear.
"Not Humans?!" exclaimed everyone.
"Yes, the villagers saw some strange footprints in the nearby forest and no one ever saw such footprints before", the king said and everyone looked confused.
"I know you all are confused. That is the reason I am asking you people to go find what's going on in that village and resolve the problem", Kind said.
"This time we don't know what creature it is and how powerful it is. So please be careful." Yashoda said with full concern in her eyes. She raised all these six like her own sons and daughters.
"Don't worry Yashu Ma. I will look after all of us and whoever brings harm or trouble to our people be it the God or the devil or a human, they will face the wrath of Ashmita", Ashmita said with a cold voice.