A familiar deep blue colored arrow flew over from the dorms, piercing through the Kavach surrounding the female invader.
It burst out like a lotus flower, dissipating the poisonous energy and impaling the invader's back with multiple spikes.
This arrow... It's Yashvi's!!
Another blue arrow bolted inside the dome of water, but the gauntlet user used his free hand to create a new spherical Kavach around the now-injured female invader.
The arrow erupted, destroying the Kavach again, but the female invader turned around in the nick of time and defended her body from the spikes with her greatsword.
Dweep kept gritting his teeth in pain as he tried his best to keep himself and Esha safe from the heavy fist that threatened to flatten them. Anik attempted to push the shield up from below with my help, but considering our thin bodies based on agility, it might be impossible for us to help.
I took hold of Aditi's arm instead and tried to pull her out of her current predicament. She squeezed her body and untangled herself, kneeling to support Dweep. She used her shoulders to lift the shield by a few centimeters, giving him enough space to free his neck from its precarious position.
Multiple arrows from the crowds behind struck the energy fist, and some even blasted the last few remaining insects gathering around our team.
I don't know what they thought while helping us, but the fist was unrelenting. The unblessed Dhanurdhars, who were already low in their Reserves, virtually did no damage to it.
Only an arrow created with eight or more points of energy can put a dent on this skill, and considering my zero Kundalini and single-digit Prana, it will be impossible for me to create.
Then I heard another sound, something that I have heard multiple times from the few Siddhi matches I often find myself going back to.
The sound from a click of fingers.
Huge Kundalini spikes that I have grown to fear jutted upwards, emerging from Dweep's shield and destroying the energy fist in an instant.
More flowers with massive petal spikes blossomed over the multi-layered Kavach surrounding the invaders, cracking and annihilating their barriers like fish bowls being dropped from a considerable height.
The snake, on the other hand, didn't stand a chance. The same devastating flowers blossomed precisely at the points on its body devoid of scales, cleaving the snake into multiple bloody wiggling sections. As if undergoing a shock, the snake's scales turned black, signaling the activation of its hypnosis stage.
The spikes had also gone through the invader's bodies, which they turned and twisted at the last moment to avoid damaging their vital points.
Experiencing all of this in an instant, the bleeding invaders found themselves bewildered from the sudden lethal attack, wondering who had antagonized them out of nowhere.
"Come inside you coward." The invader Vaidya, who was struck by Anik's arrow in his side, shouted while coughing out blood from his mouth from the new injuries he got. Even though he was constantly covered in a healing aura, along with his colleagues, it didn't seem to work properly. Especially for him. Did Anik's Blessed Arrow have an extra recovery effect reduction option?
Wait. I suddenly remembered after watching the black snake writhing in pain.
I quickly opened my messages to warn Dhruva not to make a sound, but I was a bit too late.
"You might be an idiot, but I'm not. Who the hell sets up a barrier like this? You never thought this through, huh? I don't even need to come inside to take care of your guys." Dhruva's insult appeared from the other side of the water wall.
The enemy Vaidya, started laughing. "Thanks for responding. Padmaka will take care of the rest."
Both Dweep and Anik flinched after realizing what had happened right now. I felt my heart sinking down to my stomach after remembering how the girl who had answered a question last time took her own life after getting enchanted by the snake.
"Come back after your broken and soggy spaghetti gets bigger. Or maybe this is the best mental attack you can manage with your current capabilities?" Dhruva's voice was now calm yet terrifying. He must have already shifted to his 'eradicate all enemies without further conversation' mode.
Saiyan and Shreya took the chance, wounding both the melee invaders and falling backward, getting a momentary respite from their situation. Saiyan's grimacing face now had a slight smile.
"Another one's ready." Anik whispered, taking aim with another blue swirling arrow at the gauntlet user. It pierced through his Kacach and started a lethal damage over time attack.
A cute little glowing doll was now attached to Dweep's neck, healing it rapidly. Same with Esha's leg and my palm that was riddled with holes from using my bow... Whoa, when did they appear?
The bleeding and wounded invaders realized their predicament as they inspected each others' injured bodies and already-destroyed Kavach.
While they were already getting pushed back after the Rakshaks got their Blessings, the arrival of Dhruva cemented their apparent defeat.
They fell back, running towards their other team member on the west side. The gauntlet user put up a hastily created barrier behind their backs, protecting them from several arrows our side sent towards their retreating frames.
Even the female Chosen Dhanurdhar sent out multiple arrows one after another, which bounced off, leaving significant cracks, but they were still unable to shatter the disc-shaped shield.
Red healing auras appeared around Saiyan and Shreya, recovering the wounds they had sustained during the defensive fight against Divya, the greatsword user.
The greenish hue surrounding the wounds they had, was also getting their actual skin color back.
It's been almost thirteen minutes since the fight had started, but it felt like an eternity had passed.
I couldn't even function properly for a solid fifteen minutes. Using my Prana charged arrows in quick succession had also left me light-headed. I had no choice other than using them. My normal Kundalini ones would have been simply eaten up by the sniper's arrows or wouldn't have damaged the snake at all. How much do I still need to train my body?
On second thought, Yashvi and Dhruva must have taken care of the sniper a while ago. Or did more seventh graders come to assist us?
The invaders met up a little to the east from the center of the arena and gathered around.
The sages who had completed the Blessing Ritual and joined the fight were now helplessly bound in place by chains made of bones that glowed with the same black-red aura.
How is the younger invader even more powerful than our sages? What is happening?
A crystal-shaped golden Kavach appeared around them as the invader soloing the sages till now started chanting in a devilish gargling tone.
On a closer inspection, the young invader looked much worse than the average human being. It felt like all his Prana had been sucked away, and the mysterious loan shark was sucking up the marrow within his bones next as interest. His eyes and nose were bleeding profusely, but he kept continuing the chant without a change in his tone, making sure that the letters attained the proper vibration required for whatever spell he was channeling right now.
Thousands of glitching letters appeared in the air in front of the western wall of our imprisoning dome, merging and colliding against the fabric of this dimension.
"Jay! Kriti! We'll need something huge!!" I saw Dhruva and two other seniors shouting and rushing into the arena. Having entered the Arena, their fates too, got tied up with ours. Whatever's coming from the other side of the dimensional distortion will now be faced by us together.
Esha, while getting healed by a Recovery doll, scrambled behind Dweep, who was sitting with an empty look on his face.
"Something awful is going to happen." She kept murmuring over and over.
"What about the sages?" The male senior who had entered the arena with Dhruva asked. He had a face that reminded me of celebrities in the newspapers.
The female Surakshak, named Kriti, went straight for her juniors with a similar role, who were defending the Yoddhas from the attacks of the snake and the invaders till now.
"They probably have much more lives than us, while many here have only one. If the sages can't break out of it themselves, we surely can't help them right now with our current capabilities." Dhruva and the senior kept chattering among themselves like friends.
"Surakshaks, line up!!" The guy whom Dhruva had called Jay shouted. "Those guys are summoning something nasty. Follow the instructions of your senior sister and act accordingly. We need whatever barriers you guys can create. Anything is better than nothing at this point."
Dweep got up, cracked his healed neck, and walked towards the Chosen Surakshak, who had been coordinating the Surakshaks till now after getting revived. They nodded at each other and stood side by side. More and more Surakshaks, including Aditi, appeared from the crowd and created a human wall before us. In the meantime, the Rakshaks, who also got blessed, cleared up the remaining insects in the arena.
I wasn't focusing on it while trying to take out the sniper's arrows, but they had done quite a great job in killing those pests.
The air where the letters were merging started rippling, opening up like The Destroyer's third eye, revealing a scene even more fantastical than our current scenery.
It was night on the other side, but the golden lights from a floating city up among the clouds lit up the dark sky around it like a halo.
My Kundalini had already hit zero. My Prana was in single digits. I had no skills that could help me from whatever that was going to come from the other side.
The disappointment from not getting a Blessing came back to haunt me. If only I had a blessing... Feelings of frustration and helplessness clawed at my heart, creating an uncomfortable sensation within my ribcage.
Anik completed creating and shot another of his swirly arrows at the golden Kavach surrounding the four invaders. It bounced off without even leaving a scratch.
How could the difference between the Kavach of two individuals be this different? The gauntlet guy's Kavach got easily penetrated, but another Kavach by a younger guy seemed way beyond our current levels.
Yashvi's blossoming arrow also appeared from beyond the dome and failed to breach the barrier.
"Everybody!! Keep shooting the dome!" The female Chosen Dhanurdhar ordered as dozens and dozens of energy arrows assaulted the protective barrier of our enemies in vain. People still have energy left?
I stared at Dhruva, whose hands stretched out in two opposite directions—one toward the crowd of Rakshaks and one toward the wall of Surakshaks.
I have gotten a bit sensitive towards external Kundalini by now, which was slightly different from the aura people exude for body augmentation or manifestation of skills. I could somehow feel that he was handling an enormous amount of energy right now, with the help of almost invisible threads that carried energies from one point to another.
"He's..." Esha laughed nervously, taking a glance at him. "Let's go. All we can do is provide our energy to him right now."
"Hey." Dhruva gave a slight smile as he saw us approaching. "Can you hold this in front of me?"
He summoned the opening of his dimensional box, out of which a black colored disc-shaped gem fell out.
Esha caught it mid-air and held it as instructed.
"Vaidyas!! Pour your energies into this the same way you use healing on your friends!" He shouted out.
Without a second thought, Vaidyas who were still alive, gathered around the gem, pouring their energies into it, gradually changing its color.
"Are you absorbing their Kundalini or Prana?" I asked, worried that I had already used up all the Prana beforehand, leaving nothing for him to work with.
Hearing me ask this, his expression changed to a somber one.
"It's Kundalini. You sure you want to know about it?"
"It's okay then. I only wanted to make sure you weren't using Prana since I absorbed most of it."
"Your bow?" He asked with a slight teasing smile.
"Yeah..."
"That bow is a blessing in itself." He laughed, pointing at the disc in Esha's hand, "I got that orb instead. It's pretty helpful."
Hearing that healed a part of my aching heart. The bow... If I consider it a blessing, maybe I won't feel bad anymore. How many people had a bow like mine at this moment?
The crack in the sky on the other hand, was getting wider and wider, revealing more of the golden city floating in the skies belonging to a different dimension.
"All of you are going down!!" The staff user among the invaders cackled out like a maniac.
The sages looked up at the city with panic in their faces and struggled to break free of their binds.
"Dhanurdhars, stop wasting your energy trying to breach that barrier." Jay suggested, "Fill that gem up instead if you have some energy emission skill."
"Tsk, it's taking too long." Dhruva kept checking out the crack in the air and his color-changing gem alternatively.
Suddenly, the Rakshaks around us started dropping like flies.
Panic and disorder swept across the group of Rakshaks as they tried to discover the source of this sudden anomaly.
Anik and Esha, who had been constantly using their Blessings, also collapsed.
"My Prana. It's currently at one..." Esha, who was too weak to speak, mustered the last bits of her energy and whispered.
Bringing out my status screen, I saw my Prana currently sitting at five when It should have been at least 8 or 9...
And, it dropped to four right in front of my eyes.
"Something is sucking up our Prana. People are losing consciousness because they are hitting that limiter you talked about." I communicated my findings to Dhruva and the Vaidyas standing around the gem. Someone else was holding it after Esha collapsed.
But before we could use that information, a world-shattering humming sound assaulted our ears.
"It's coming." Murmurs spread as we all stared at the portal in the sky with a look of helplessness.
"Yeah, I can also see that! You guys, push everything you have into that gem!! Fast!!" Dhruva commanded anxiously.
"Go go go!! Surakshaks, bring out your barriers!!" Jay shouted, taking command over the whole fifth grade. "Keep your skills activated. Stack them up one after another!! We will make sure you have enough energy to do that!"
"I will create a primary barrier. Follow its surface as a reference to where you should summon your shields!" The female Surakshak named Kriti announced, erecting a curved energy shield separating the west and east. It totally looked like those trendy television sets with rounded screens in advertisements.
A star twinkled in the lower part of the floating city, summoning an intense pressure of death over us.
The star grew larger, morphing into a spherical shape that swallowed up the night sky inside the dimensional crack. A thin membrane over the opening broke away, allowing the ray of energy to invade our dimension.
The devastating yellow light spread out, flooding the arena's west side and engulfing the chained-up sages. The fertile soil hardened and cracked, breaking away and disintegrating under the enormous force of the ray. Rolling over the Kavach that protected the invaders, the yellow tsunami soon reached the first level of our barriers.
There were now hundreds of them, generated from our Surakshaks, stacked on top of each other, as well as side by side above Kriti's barrier.
But they broke away as if made out of paper, allowing the ray of light to make its way through each stack without much difficulty.
Dhruva looked around desperately after glancing at the incoming ray of death.
"Jay! Take over my Tethers. The orb is finally ready. I told you not to use up all the energy stored within the orb to take out the invaders! Shit always devolves to the worst-case scenario." He called for the senior coordinating with Kriti to ensure the barriers were set up correctly.
Beyond our shields, the dark red aura around the severely wounded youngest invader slowly dissipated away, resulting in the eye-shaped portal closing up as if it were merely going back to sleep.
The ray became narrower but more concentrated, breaking through more and more of our barriers. The point where the two energies collided seemed to be from a scene you often see in welding shops: a stream of metallic fire that almost blinds your sight.
If the crack had been fully open for a few more seconds, we could have been wiped out like the sages. Or we still can be... Since it was closing up too slowly. The energy from the ray itself was breaking through the dimensional wall that was trying its best to repair itself.
I mulled over the situation's absurdity, watching the colliding ray filling my vision with a yellow-white hue.
What kind of a binding was it, that even rendered those powerful sages unable to use their skills and energies? How did someone so young even have a skill like that?
What kind of a city shoots laser beams across dimensions? How long can our shields even hold on... Questions kept bubbling up to the surface of my consciousness.
The Surakshaks, who were standing and still had a little bit of Prana left in them, kept their skills in running mode. Their barriers kept regenerating after getting destroyed, but the tsunami of energy kept inching toward us like an unstoppable force of nature.
After Jay took Dhruva's place, he stood in the same way as Dhruva, stretching out his hands in Titanic style.
Meanwhile, Dhruva stepped back giving him space, and started absorbing the energy from his gem, which was now humming with energy. It had also turned white from its previous obsidian black color.
"This is a good time for you to show what you're supposed to do." He said in a serious tone to nobody in particular. Is he talking to motivate himself?
Dhruva, after creating small blobs of energy with high-speed complicated hand gestures and kneading techniques, chucked them toward the energy ray with his full might.
Then something really interesting happened.
With slight movements of his fingers, those blobs floated in the air, following his instructions and attaching themselves to Kriti's layer of shield nearest to us. All the other shields were being summoned on the other side of that base barrier.
Those condensed energy beads reminded me of a spiderweb that refracted sunlight after catching the early dew of dawn.
They expanded, leaving a thin trail behind, making sure the main bodies that were converging in the middle were the thickest.
"Don't stray to the sides! Group together in the middle!!" Jay again shouted, grimacing under the weight of the Kundalini transfer network from the dead Rakshaks behind to the Surakshaks in front.
To think Dhruva came up with a skill similar to my bow, when faced with despair.
I remembered what Dhruva had been doing with Vihaan's corpse in that tunnel and the last proper conversation we had.
His actions, which didn't conform to the moralities I had cultivated in life, were ultimately the same ones I carried out with my bow just a few minutes ago.
I gave a long drawn-out sigh, stealing Dhruva's attention for a second. But he kept stretching both of his hands out upwards, toward the shield he was creating, as he continuously mumbled something over and over again.
With a massive shattering sound, Kriti's final barrier also broke, exposing Dhruva's last-ditch effort shield to the incoming ray.
The convex shield parted the ray into thousands of thinner strands that crawled along the surface of his shield, ultimately reaching and obliterating the ground on our two sides but somehow still managing to keep an island of safe space in between.
Within seconds, massive cracks also started appearing on it as the Surakshaks standing in a line till now moved over to individual teams following Jay's orders.
All the remaining groups of Rakshaks carried the ones who were unconscious and stood along the edge of the safe island, as close as possible to the destruction still going on beyond it, putting up domes of Kavach around themselves.
"Dhruva!!" I saw Dweep beckoning Dhruva over while carrying Anik like a traveling rucksack, reminding me to look around for Aditi. She too, was waving at me from a position she had booked on our left while facing the ray coming in from the east. I picked up Esha and placed her on my shoulder.
"Sorry... A 64-point shield might have held out a bit longer. This is the most I could do." Dhruva apologized with a disappointed face. "Aditi will keep you three safe."
'Stay safe.' I too wanted to tell him, but after the last few weeks of him actively avoiding me, I couldn't. Considering my overreaction back at the dungeon when he was only trying his best to protect us, I won't blame him for still holding a grudge.
Witnessing him cutting up Vihaan's body in that tunnel was too much for me. Only later did I realize what he was trying to do. But by then, the fear and disgust I had felt for him made me react in ways I can't take back anymore. And now, I myself have done the same thing for the sake of keeping my friends safe.
From next time, I vowed not to ever judge people's actions from my perspective alone.
We went on different ways to our teams' Surakshaks, trying to weather the incoming blast under their protection.
Dhruva squeezed himself inside Dweep's Kavach, squabbling with Jay, who was standing outside their barrier about something.
Jay desperately ran back to Kriti and took shelter inside her Kavach.
"You okay?" Shreya asked me after hearing me sigh at their comedy.
"Hopefully, we all will stay okay after what's coming." I gave her a dry smile. "Don't die, or you know what will happen."
I knew my words would hurt her a bit since the only life I had lost was because of Kalpa's system that allowed the Chosen to steal lives from the people positionally closer to them.
"Yeah, I know." She mumbled softly.
The final shield above us broke into pieces, bathing us all in the yellow light.
While the scenery outside disappeared, the intense humming and vibrating sounds as the ground in the middle disintegrated, kept hammering the insides of my ear drums.
Gravel and soil kept bombarding our Kavach like hail, leaving small cracks on its surface from their impacts. They kept getting bigger and bigger as they merged and spread out like the distributaries of a river.
Then, it suddenly stopped.
The light slowly faded away, revealing a huge golden shield covering the portal in the sky from the other side. With the destructive ray no longer passing through it, the fabric of this dimension healed itself, closing up and disappearing like it never existed.
I saw Yashvi entering the dome with four more sages, who kept concentrating hard on their barrier until the hole closed up fully.
As Aditi removed the barrier, I stood up straight from my kneeling position, looking at the remnants of the disaster.
The green, fertile soil had turned into a dry and dead river bed. A deep ravine in the middle now separated the Rakshaks in the arena, and the cracks left by the blast were smoldering with a radioactive yellow glow.
Glancing behind westward, I saw the bodies of dead Rakshaks still intact but without their heads.
I instinctively felt that something was very, very wrong.
If Esha was still conscious, she could have pinpointed the problem. I could sense a bizarre alien energy surrounding my body but couldn't put a finger on the feeling.
The sages who came with Yashvi started attacking the golden crystal Kavach of the invaders mercilessly, which finally started leaving numerous scratches on its surface.
As if they didn't just try to cause a massacre, the invaders inside started having a heated discussion about something.
After a few seconds, the guy with gauntlets handed them to his staff-using-colleague and turned his back to the youngest invader with a determined look.
Within seconds, he disintegrated to dust, leaving behind a swirling ball of energy: his chakra.
The enemy Vaidya touched it with his twirly staff, which had turned back to its non-tree form, and waved it, pointing towards our direction.
Multiple portals opened up below the dead bodies that had lost their heads, swallowing them up in an instant before we could even do something.
Once their job was done, the youngest invader opened up a blood-red portal inside their golden Kavach and disappeared into it, with the other two following him.
Just as suddenly as they had arrived, they also disappeared as if this place was a mere playground for them.
Silence descended on the battlefield after the terrorists went back. At first, I had reservations about calling them that, but after they even stole the bodies of Rakshaks who had died, I didn't need to think twice about it.
I examined my surroundings to find the Rakshaks helping each other. Many groups had their Kavach destroyed during the plan's final phase, causing their members to lose parts of their bodies.
The Vaidyas got into action, trying to keep them alive until more sages arrived.
I made my way toward Yashvi and the other seniors who were grouping up together to discuss something. They were watching some video stream on one of their status screens.
Yashvi found me and gave a quick hug, "Thank God you are safe. See what I got!!" She brought out a beautifully carved ivory bow with multiple strings from her dimensional room.
"This... The spoils from the sniper! Nice work!!" I was genuinely excited seeing her wonderful smile.
"You guys should go back and help your batchmates as soon as the sages lift this barrier. We'll take care of the rest." Dhruva interrupted our wonderful reunion, prompting me to glare at him while pouting.
"Okay okay, got it. Take your time. Who am I to interfere between an idol and her fan." He teased me with a slight smile. But there was a certain darkness and disappointment underneath.
I'll think about that later. Let's show Yashvi my bow first. I have told her about my weapon but she never got to see it in person.
As I brought out my bow and proceeded to hand it over to her, a voice snapped inside my brain.
"Little child. Don't even think about allowing a third party to come in contact with my noble being. I'll suck up all their essence!" The voice of an old grandma rattled my brain.
"Sorry. The Prana suckers are a bit dangerous. They only recognize me..." I gave my best to look disappointed.
"Ohh, don't worry, I understand. I've heard about this before; specific weapons can recognize who their owners are. It seems like your bow has the seed of an Ayudhapurusha. Try your best to germinate it." Her eyes twinkled with interest.
"You know how to go about doing that?" I asked for more information.
Does the voice inside my brain already signify that the weapon's sentience has germinated?
"I think it requires a bit of divinity. Most Ayudhapurushas are born from the essence of divine beings. Your bow most probably was made from the materials extracted from such a living form." She described. "But they still will remain in a dormant state until you find a catalyst. Many weapons don't get lucky enough to move on to the next stage."
That clicked something in my brain. Did my bow devour the Blessing I was supposed to get? Or was the Blessing targeted at my bow since my results in the Utsaav were basically derived from its abilities?
All in all, I now had a nascent Ayudhapurusha that I'd need to take care of. I wonder what form it will take in its expression stage.
That invader girl's weapon gave birth to a giant snake... I can't wait for mine to grow up too.
"It will not be that easy. Aren't you getting a little too optimistic?" The granny's voice registered from no particular direction. It was a weird sensation.
The four sages, by that time, had completed setting up a vast Chitram in the middle of the arena.
"We will be collecting the leftover Kundalini from the attack that obliterated this place and use it to break open the water dome. Protect yourselves since we don't know what kind of reaction it will have." The sages announced.
"My Kavach will be enough to take care of you all." Kriti confidently declared, surrounding herself, me, Yashvi, Jay, and Jhanvi within her silver spherical barrier.
A brilliant ray of light emerged from the Chitram, shooting upwards and piercing through the dome of water.
Like a washing machine that alternates its rotation every few seconds, the white light mixed with the dome's energy and created beautiful spiral patterns.
I felt a familiar tugging sensation of my Prana getting absorbed as the dome kept trying to regenerate itself.
Something instinctively told me that it won't stop until everybody's Prana hit the limiter. It was only a matter of time.
What I understood was that barriers can be broken from the side where constraints are placed. Since it allows everything inside, we can't break it from outside.
To break it, we need an obstruction that will only be provided by the barrier when things from inside are trying to go out.
I opened my status and watched my Prana lowering down to 2 points. My body was already feeling heavy and stiff. This will probably be my first time touching the limiter. Will surely be an experience...
People in their domes were also collapsing one after another. It was now the unblessed ones' turn to hit their thresholds who didn't get to use their Prana to activate their blessings.
Before my eyes became heavy, inviting sleep, I saw Yashvi supporting me with a caring smile.
"Don't lose your own consciousness while trying to take care of someone else." I heard Dhruva's faint voice talking with Yashvi. "Like this guy."
I only saw a glimpse of Jay slumped like a doll in Dhruva's arms before blacking out.