Although Rudra had defeated all the members of the Masaan clan, who knew if other members of the Masaan clan arrived as well? Therefore he ran away from there as fast as he could and kept running until he came far enough from that place. But the thing was that he had run in the opposite direction, the more dense part of the forest.
Rudra found a huge tree which seemed like the tree lord of that area, very specific and tall, with thick branches that spread long and wide that anyone could easily sleep on them, Rudra decided that for now, he would have some rest on this tree as he was completely exhausted due to the fight he had.
Rudra climbed upon the tree and sat on one of the branches of the tree. Rudra knew the fact that soon those arrogant members of the Masaan clan would come there searching for him. Therefore he had to be careful from such encounters, he always wouldn't be as lucky as the last time. Rudra just sat down on the branch in the lotus position and began to meditate to recover as fast as he could.
After a few days…..
Rudra finally opened his eyes after cultivating his energy continuously for a few days, he had recovered all of his exhausted energy, and all his wounds were also nearly healed completely. Now all Rudra had to do while sitting there was to form the rank 2 medicines.
Rudra immediately took out his medicine bowl and released his kundalini. But as soon as his kundalini came in touch with the medicine bowl, the bowl burst up into pieces under the slightest pressure of his kundalini.
Rudra was shocked and didn't know what to do.
'What if I try to form medicines without a bowl? ', although this was risky, and his medicinal herbs could be wasted but risks are needed to be taken sometimes.
Rudra took out the sack bag full of red somniferra cherry and took out the ingredient box, and right now he had a total of 14 spiritual somna fruits, 14 green line flowers, and the other ingredients in such an amount that he could make the bone-strengthening pill for 30 times.
Rudra used his kundalini to lift them in the air and tried to extract their raw materials without a bowl. But on his first try, when he extracted the raw materials one of the ingredients got damaged and spoiled the other extracted materials, ruining his work till now.
Rudra sighed and took out another set. This time after a few days he succeeded in extracting the materials without a bowl, but now the problem was to mix them. At first, when Rudra tried to mix the raw materials a bad smelly gas began to emerge out of them, and all the materials were wasted.
The next time Rudra tried again all the raw materials were burnt down due to a little more pressure from his kundalini. He had to practice making medicines without a bowl and control his kundalini, even a slight mistake was wasting his ingredients.
After spending days trying to form a pill, thinking about different ideas, and wasting a total of 25 sets of ingredients, finally an idea struck his mind. According to the ideas and mistakes he had made in these tries he was sure this way would work. Rudra took out a set of ingredients and released his kundalini.
Spreading it like a net, he covered all those ingredients together in his kundalini. He was now using his kundalini as a bowl to form the medicine. In this way, he could also keep an eye on the ingredients properly.
Rudra inside the net of his kundalini began to pressurize the ingredients and extract their raw materials. He was trying to extract all those raw materials at once so that once extracted he wouldn't have to be distracted to extract the other raw materials and hence he could easily mix them without destroying them.
But this time Rudra used his kundalini to directly extract the essence of those ingredients instead of the raw materials and then purify them. Gradually, a lot of particles started to scatter out of those ingredients. Soon all the ingredients turned into particles and began to gather at the center.
Those particles were mostly like liquid molecules that came out of those ingredients, Rudra used his kundalini to generate excess pressure, forcing the particles to merge together and dry out into a solid composition due to the heat generated by it.
But before that Rudra sent his spiritual energy remnant and then Rudra began to refine it with his body energy while it absorbed his spiritual energy and used his body energy to separate the residues and refine the main medicine into the pill form.
The pill formation was complete. It was a red colored pill, with a tint of green on it. Rudra grabbed that pill and kept it in a box. Although he had succeeded, this process of forming pills was much more exhausting for Rudra than before, although it led to the refinement of the finest form of medicine.
Rudra then began to meditate and rest for the whole day to recover his energy fast. Rudra made this his routine and repeated the same process every day. Rudra kept repeating this process to drain himself and then meditate, this was also helping him to have better control over his increased kundalini.
He kept forming the bone-strengthening pill for 20 days until all the herbs for that pill were diminished, he jumped down the tree to gather the ingredients. But when he came down, 'Oh no!', he realized that he had lost the way to the city.
All he did was pick a random direction and walk past those huge trees and dense leaves continuously until he found a way out. After walking for half a day, luckily Rudra was able to approach from where he could see the edge of the forest. He ran there immediately to see that the edge lay in front of massive terrain.
The land that sloped down to that massive flat terrain was filled with massive rocks placed across, green grass fields, and at a distance, all Rudra could see were just a few monuments. After walking a little further he realized that it was just a small town. Rudra ran towards that town.
The town was built near a river and the river flew across the land to the horizon with bending curves, filling its surroundings with life and greenery. There was a curvy trail built to the entrance of the town from the forest, simply depicting the way to the town.
Rudra followed the path which also had a few large trees along its sidelines, after walking for a few minutes Rudra finally arrived at the town gate, he entered through, and right in front were the gatekeepers of the town and there were a huge queue of people waiting to be let inside. Rudra could get a map of the way back to City from there.
After waiting for a few minutes in the queue, the gatekeepers who were the soldiers of the empire's army checked on him and let him in. After walking a few steps ahead Rudra came on a cozy stone road that led into the town.
The stone road went to narrow places bending itself with the way, rounded stones were set closely together, whereas the edges were lined with moss adding a green touch to it. Rudra guided by that road came to the main streets of the town which were filled with a variety of shops and stalls on the sideways.
After searching in the streets for 10 minutes straight, he finally found a map shop on a specific street where there was a huge monument. It seemed like the branch of a clan, and as soon as he looked at the badges of the members roaming around he realized that it was the branch of his own clan.
This meant that this town came into his clan's territory, therefore he decided to pay a visit to the branch to get some help to get back to the city.
Rudra decided that he should still buy a map of the surrounding areas and terrain to be able to guide properly next time and not get lost like this. He approached the map store, taking in the scent of aged parchment and the sight of rolled-up maps lining the shelves.
Rudra went to the map store, "Do you have a detailed map of the surrounding areas and cities?"
The old man looked at Rudra and said, "Check this out, I have drawn it recently, and although small in size, I have tried to mention all the brief details of the surrounding areas and city in quite an organized way.", he said as he enrolled a small map on the counter.
Rudra checked the map and nodded in approval, "How much for this?".
The shopkeeper said, "Three iron shillings!"
Rudra sighed as he took out the three iron shillings and bought the map in exchange. Then Rudra approached the skambha branch outpost nearby. The entrance was marked by a wooden gate and the whole outpost was enclosed with solid brick walls filled with some patterns the outpost exuded an aura of authority over that town, But as he was about to enter the guards at the entrance stopped him.
"Sorry, guest, but we can't let you enter until you have the members batch or permission from the headquarters in the city.", one of the guards said.
Rudra immediately pulled out his skambha clan batch, and looking at the batch the guards let him enter inside. Although the outpost was smaller than the headquarters in the Kashvyagiri it was one of the biggest monuments of this town.
Upon entering he was greeted by a spacious courtyard paved with smooth stones, its center dominated by a large Banyan tree whose roots seemed to spread in the whole area like blood veins. The tree leaves rustling softly in the breeze. Around the courtyard, pillared verandahs stretched out, each leading to various chambers that housed the clan branch's activities.
Directly opposite to the entrance through the courtyard a stone pavement led to the open main hall and to the sides of the courtyard were the clan member quarters.
Rudra walked in with only one thought in his mind, "I shall reach back to the city as fast as possible, or I will miss the clan tournament."
Here in Kashvyagiri city near the North entrance, stood a boy wearing a cloak, and his face was hidden by the hood of the cloak. The boy seemed to be waiting for someone, but then someone called to him, "Sourav!"
Sourav turned around to find a young man wearing a cloak with his face hidden as well, "Why did you call me here?!"
"You remember the deal between us?"
"Yes, as a powerful and one of the top ten members of the clan, I will help you, and you will help me become the leader of the Skambha clan."
"well, just a final preparation then our leader will be strong enough, and by seizing the territory of the skambha clan we will take over all the clans in the state, but your leader Vihaan is the biggest obstacle, send him away as soon as possible, or we will just wait", the young man said with pride and excitement mixed in his voice.
"don't worry, just fulfill your promise!"