[A.N: From here on, to provide more clarity about who is leading the scene, I'll directly mention the narrator at the beginning of the POV marker (`````). Enjoy! Comment! and Share maybe? ]
``````````````` :Klei:
"What have you done Protector?"
[*crack*...*rip*]
As the space ripped apart and the atmosphere around the cottage became like a violently razing thunderstorm, the protector appeared as if the Gods were descending after a hundred thousand years. His emerging figure gave me slight chills as he stepped foot out of the void and into the forest.
[ I AM OF NO CONSEQUENCE. WHAT HAPPENS TO ONE IS THEIR OWN DESTINY. ]
Maricha, his voice echoed the whole forest but no one other than me could have heard his voice because it wasn't intended for them.
[ EVEN THE GREAT RAKSHASA COULDN'T CROSS THIS "REKHA" ]
He was talking about the barrier cast around the cottage. The cottage, although broken, was an unerased relic of a time as old as the world. Its broken walls were made up of materials that couldn't even be found anywhere thousands of kilometres around the forest.
This cottage was as much of a mystery as the spell that made Maricha an immortal.
[ IT IS ALREADY A MIRACLE THAT HIS SOUL IS STILL INTACT ]
[Rekha] was also called as "World barrier". It was a lost ancient art from the "Era of the Gods" and no mortal had survived after so much as putting a finger inside the barrier, but surprisingly enough Vihaan, although unconscious and breathing very faintly, was still alive.
"What will happen to him?"
Maricha was a deer with a shiny golden pelt. White and dark grey spots were littered around its body like dew on grass after a foggy morning.
His three-feet long blood-diamond antlers were a sight to behold. His feminine voice and majestic body made him look as if he was the mount of the Gods.
"He won't die right?", I repeated.
However, instead of answering my questions, Maricha simply stared at Vihaan with a curious look on his golden face. After a long pause, he said with visible doubt in his voice.
"...I don't think he will."
It was an expression that I hadn't seen Maricha make even once in the hundreds of years I had known him.
Who was he? He was the King of the Dandakarnaya forest - a mysterious Jungle that spanned more than 1000 Kilometers in all directions and consisted of mysteries that even Yakshas were afraid to explore.
Maricha was famously known as 'The Protector' not because he protected mortals from the horrors of Dandakarnaya forest or because he safeguarded the "Rekha" created by Gods, but rather because of the fact that his existence itself was a symbol of the natural order.
"As long as Maricha lives, all is right with the world" was a famous saying that was common across various kingdoms of the Bharat.
-------------
** AFTER A FEW MINUTES
[* enters the cottage *]
Maricha had used his divine blessings to command the vines spread across the cottage to grab Vihaan's unconscious body and bring it inside the warped gate.
The other side of the crumbling wall could be seen clearly from the holes, but just as we entered through the broken doorframe, the scenery turned into a view even more grandiose than thousands of falling stars on a clear night.
"This path always makes me motion-sick."
I had to grab my head for a second.
The nausea of crossing dimensions via the void corridor was just like being thrown into a whirlpool while drunk.
"You would've gotten used to it by now if you hadn't broken your promise...", Maricha looked sad as he made that remark.
"You know it better... I had to."
It was an excuse I had prepared in advance.
Even though I had broken my promise to Maricha after being saved by him, I had done it with the greatest of reluctance. After all, leaving "Bhulok" at that time was a matter of life and death for me.
[ A.N - 'Bhulok' means 'Earth']
"Home, huh?", Maricha took a long pause, it was as if he was reminiscing something from a distant past.
"...You still call them your family even after what they did?", Maricha didn't look kindly to my family, no sane being would. They were, after all, the ruthless royalty of the Yaksha clan.
Yakshas, although called natural spirits, were still a result of copulation between two Yakshas. However, different from mortals, copulation didn't mean sex for our kind, but rather, we were born through a process called 'Komunista'.
As we walked through the halls of the magnificent castle littered with priceless jewels and worldly treasures, I observed that Maricha was in deep thoughts.
His hooves were making a faint 'thud' sound with every step he took and the lights on both sides of the corridor lit up as he walked closer and closer to the end of the hall.
"You want to know why I brought him here?" I poked a little.
"I don't need anything from you", Maricha replied with a pouting face, followed right after by a minute of awkward silence.
"...(*sigh*) I'm sorry... alright!", I had to get the brooding Maricha satisfied somehow, "...I'm sorry that I couldn't come sooner."
However, even after my honest apology, he still kept silent.
He was leading the path, followed by me, and a bunch of grapevines that carried Vihaan on their tangled branches and leaves.
"First ...", Maricha spoke, "...I find you with three mortal kids in my forest, and now this!"
The hairs on his back had started lighting up with his trademark golden hue. This was a sign that he was genuinely angered by what had happened to the three kids.
"...Aren't you becoming too confident in yourself by breaking the rules of the forest?"
The first rule of Dandakarnaya: divine beings were to turn a blind eye to mortal's business until and unless they were in direct conflicts with each other.
"...And how did you even find two Devarshies in such a short time, are they common vegetables nowadays?"
There was confusion on his face. It was as if even after seeing Vihaan, he couldn't believe it. Maricha was also someone who couldn't leave the boundaries of the Dandakarnaya forest, so he had no clue about what was going on outside the forest.
He was in great agony by Vihaan's presence because he had never had to doubt his reality in the last many millenniums. I could understand his pain because even I was the same when I first saw Vihaan using the 'sixth sense.'
Vihaan was no mere mortal by what I had seen, he was special and that's why I had taken the risk of bringing him to Maricha; despite the fact that Maricha - the all-powerful being - was angry with me.
The glorious Maricha walking ahead of me was the 999th in the line of rather long generations of protectors. Every Maricha lived for only 1000 years and perished when the clock struck midnight on their thousandth birthday, only to rise again from the ash of his previous birth like a phoenix.
This was the curse of Maricha - to be reborn again and again after every 1000 years to repent for his sin. A sin from his first life when he was an Asura. He had already lived more than 999999 years and he was going to finish his millionth one this year.
For humans and other races, Maricha was a divine protector that maintained the balance in nature, but in reality, he was just a pitiful old deer whose life was long overdue.
"Are you sure he is a Devarshi?", I asked expectantly.
If Vihaan turned out to be a Devarshi, it would be a great help to Rudy, who had a deep-rooted distrust for all of humanity. Even I knew that he was too weak to go against the countless human powerhouses that ruled the continent.
"I'm not sure actually", he replied.
"How can you be not sure?"
"Because I can't see through him"
"What do you mean?"
"...*silence*"
I thought that Maricha was playing with me for breaking my promise. He must have already known that I was worried about whether Vihaan was a Devarshi or not.
In my whole life, I had not seen Maricha struggle to answer a question. His not knowing something was akin to the sun not rising in the morning, a fact against the flow of nature and time.
"I brought him to meet you because I thought you would kno..."
[*grim*]
"WHAT? HOW IS THIS HAPPENING?" Maricha exclaimed using his divine voice.
"What is happenning?"
"CAN'T YOU SENSE IT?"
"can't sense what?"
(*Bam Bam*)
[*Maricha falls to his knees*]
[*Klei falls flat on the ground with his arms extended*]
"HE IS GOING THROUGH THE OVERDOSE!", the overbearing divine pressure that suddenly took over the whole castle made both of us incapable for a split second.
(*whoosh*....*crack*....*crack*....)
And then it started.
The most vicious and violent Overdose I had seen or heard in all of my life.
A thunderous sound, as if the God of Thunder was playing an orchestra, rumbled the whole castle.
The Prana that existed in the castle began to violently circle in small spheres and went crazy all over the place.
"Doesn't this prove that he too is a Devarshi?"
I shouted in the midst of the thunderous storm. The sudden pressure was gone and Vikram's body started floating a couple of inches above the vines.
"HE IS DEAD IS WHAT HE IS... AND IF HE DOESN'T OVERCOMES THIS TRIAL SO ARE WE"
"You don't mean to say, that he might....", I couldn't even complete my sentence in the fear of what was to come if Vihaan really turned.
There were a few facts about Devarshies that I hadn't told Rudy yet.
- Every mortal is born with a 'protection' - the mark of the Divine, but only 1 in 100 million mortals are born with a mark that can sustain the 'contract', and only these rare mortals are called "Devarshies".
- A 'contract' can only be formed before the Devarshi turns 9 years of age.
- More than half of the Devarshies who can't form a contract before the stipulated time go into an Overdose because of the mark overtaking their bodies.
- There are only three outcomes when an Overdose happens: Life, Death, and Kaal.
If a Devarshi survives the Overdose, even without the help of a superior contract, it was guaranteed that he/she would become a strong Sage. However, among the other two options, Death was always a more welcomed choice.
And right now, Vihaan showed the signs that both Maricha and I feared could redirect the world towards Doomsday - a reality that, if manifested, could end 1/15th of the creation into nothingness.
[ A.N - according to Hindu legends, there are 15 major planes of existence. 7 above and 7 below the human realm. These realms aren't physically stacked above one another though, but are like different frequencies in one colour spectrum. ]