Twenty minutes later.
Viswa is sitting on a rock. His whole body is covered in blood and sweat.
He looked at Mathur in front of him. He collapsed on the ground with no energy left. His tendons are destroyed and he could not even stand up. He could not even feel his limbs.
All he could feel are his head and his torso, he felt like that is all left of his body.
"Just kill me."
Mathur said weakly.
"Don't worry I will, but not before you spill the beans."
"I will tell you everything. Please just kill me."
"Good, just tell me."
"Every year our village sends a few people to the Black Sand Village to attempt the admission test. For some reason, it is very hard for the people of our village to pass. But pass or fail is secondary nowadays because the instructor in charge of our hillside village made it almost impossible for our village's kids to even enter the academy.
He demanded massive bribes, but our villagers were pretty united. We wanted to report him and one time we did that too.
But not only was there no action, as a retaliation, the instructor kidnapped three young women from our village. To this day, we do not know whether they are dead or alive.
This year also he demanded bribes. And this time, some of us showed some talent. So, the village head collected money from all over the village and gave it to him.
We were all set to go to the entrance examination.
But not all of them are happy. Makar who is our leader since we were kids, was a guy who stays composed no matter what. He was patient with all the humiliation and injustice we were suffering.
His strategy is to bide our time.
Because the only thing that would throw us out of this predicament is power. If one of our villagers becomes strong enough, we would be able to get rid of that instructor for good.
Of course, some of us were very impatient and wanted to be less of a burden. We wanted to hunt a shark and give it to the village head so that some burden on them would refuse.
Ten people, left that village that day and entered the sea.
Of course, we are just naïve kids. How can we hunt a shark successfully with that puny power?
We were instead toyed by it and two of us were dead. After it had its full, it just injured the rest and left.
Then we came across something underneath the sea.
A large object that looked like an egg.
It is almost six feet tall and it looked dark with a glossy exterior.
When I touched it, it opened up like a flower. A bunch of seeds that are the size of a chicken were present.
We were attracted by that seed and could not help but take them. We thought they are some kind of special type of pearls or something. They looked like gemstones to us. So, we took them.
But only after a while did, we realize, these seeds are not gemstones and they don't have a monetary value. Rather they have other values.
They can give us strength like we have never seen before.
All eight of us managed to become physically stronger in that short period of time.
We managed to get placed in the exam decently high along with Makar.
Of course, Makar who did not know what was happening was extremely delighted that all of us passed the exam.
We entered the academy and the only thing that we needed was to bide our time, train and become strong enough to beat the crap out of that instructor.
But fate had other plans. The instructor started extorting the village even more with us being in the academy as an excuse. I guess you already know that.
When his extortion reached a limit, we decided to take it up on ourselves to relieve the burden of the village. We needed money. And we needed it a lot.
Then only we came across Pat, the Circle 2 student who is also a lackey of Kai.
He wanted us to do two things. Use the orphanage as the bait to lure you out and kill you. We met with a lot of Circle 1 students who wanted in on this plan. A lot of noble kids sent their lackeys with us.
We tried to deal with you, the kids were just bait. We never really had any intention of kill them. We knew that you are strong enough and you would be able to save them. The one kid that died is because of my carelessness. I did not expect to kill him at all.
Of course, we knew that we cannot kill you that easily even with the kids as bait. So, I ground one of the seeds and took a portion of that powder to add to your pills. To weaken you. But it seems like it did not work.
You know what happened from there."
Viswa was not that surprised by the story. He guessed a lot of it. Of course, the large egg and the seeds are something he did not think of. But he definitely thought that Kai might be involved one way or the other.
"Everything is fine. But the numbers do not add up. How many demonic cultivators are there in the academy now?"
"Three of them. Except for Makar, the others from the hillside village are people that took those seeds. We did not know it is related to the demons, otherwise, we would not have taken them in."
"Good to know, that there are only three more lives to take away from to get rid of this demonic energy. It is getting on my nerves.
Let us get this over with. I will take away your life."
"I can understand your anger, but please do not do anything to the villagers. They are all innocent."
"Sure."
Viswa said as he took out a tonic and gave it to Mathur.
He suddenly felt his body recover. He felt confused. But Viswa did not explain anything. Instead, he just tied him to a post and started piling firewood around him.
"I said I will kill you, but it is not going to be an easy death."
Viswa said as he set the fire food on fire.
Mathur felt his body burning.
"ARGHHHHHHHHHHH…."
An agonized scream escaped his mouth. Of course, his body is not exactly a flammable material that caught on fire instantly.
He slowly burned as Viswa threw one log after another into the fire to increase it. It took hours for Mathur to completely burn off leaving his skeleton on that post.
It is almost dawn. Viswa took away everything that could be traced to him. He threw the dead bodies into a pile and set them on fire along with a lot of firewood, before he jumped into the sea.
Just like he said to Mathur, he swam in the sea until he reached the reeves before he started collecting sea food. With his current level, it was pretty easy for him to catch a bunch of crabs and shells.
He found a full basket of them in no time and returned to the village. He submitted the food in the academy before he went to check the kids in the inn.
He was relieved to see all of them.
But after five minutes of him being in the inn, Student Union President came running to meet him.
"Viswa, I need to talk to you."
His expression is serious.
Viswa got out and looked at him in askance.
"Where did you go last night?"
"I took a mission and went to the reeves to collect some seafood."
"Why would you go do such a mission when your home was attacked a few hours ago?"
"I wanted to calm my mind. So, I went to the sea to calm my mind."
"In the middle of the night? When the tide is the highest? A sea would be calm at that time?"
"I can find the calm in that chaotic sea. If you know where I came from, you would understand. Anyway, why are you interrogating me? If you have that much free time in your hands, why don't you go and interrogate whoever has done this to my home?
I already told you, I will destroy anything and anyone to get what I want. It seems like you are taking my words lightly."
"No, the very reason I am here is because I took your threat seriously.
We found out who attacked the orphanage, they are mostly lackeys of some nobles. Of course, I am not going to tell you which nobles. But there is one suspect that we are surprised by.
Mathur.
Just like you said, he consumed a high grade medicine yesterday to heal his wound. But last night, he disappeared along with a bunch of his people. And you were also not here in the academy. Tell me, did you kill all of them?"