The Highland Leaf – Restaurant & Inn...
The cold night air brushed against Kaal Nayan's mask as he quietly pushed open the back door—
The same one used for vegetable deliveries and garbage runs.
No one noticed him.
No one ever did when he didn't want to be seen.
He stepped into the dark hallway and shut the door behind him.
His footsteps were soundless as he walked down the corridor and entered the surveillance room.
Surveillance room...
Inside, soft screens glowed.
Live camera feeds.
Streets. Dabba.
Hotel halls. Roads.
The room fell silent the moment he entered.
"____"
"____"
"____"
Amirtha glanced back and gave a small nod.
Nod~
Junoo stared wide-eyed at the blood on his knuckles.
Guru Arvind stood with arms crossed, eyes fixed on the monitor, saying nothing at first.
"____"
Then his gravelly voice broke the silence.
"You did well."
Kaal Nayan said nothing.
He walked over to the corner and sat in the shadow, unstrapping the knuckle-bracer Astra from his coat pocket and placing it gently on the metal table beside him.
The red shimmer still pulsed faintly from its core.
That was when Guru Arvind spoke again, this time with a note of grim satisfaction.
"The moment you let those two walk out with greed in their eyes… I knew you understood what needed to be done."
He turned slightly to face him.
"I've sent Shiva, Ravi, and Sandeep to tail them."
The monitor zoomed in on a grainy street cam feed.
Two shadows, a bike, and a car slowly tailing the unsuspecting terrorists through the dark alleys of the city.
"They'll lead us to their safe house. Or better…"
He smiled faintly.
"Their base."
Junoo's eyes widened.
"You let them go... so we could follow them?"
Amirtha added calmly,
"Rudra understood that perfectly. The moment he didn't go for the kill shot, I knew. It's classic silent tracking. Better than any interrogation."
Guru Arvind nodded.
"The best traps are not sprung. They are followed."
He looked at Rudra—Kaal Nayan—
And his expression softened with rare pride.
"You did well."
Suddenly, Amirtha noticed.
The screens flickered for a moment.
"We lost visual."
Amirtha muttered, narrowing her eyes at the empty road feed.
Rudra—Kaal Nayan—
Immediately turned toward Junoo.
"Get Shiva's location. They've crossed the border. We're blind."
Junoo's fingers flew across the controls.
She quickly connected to Shiva's headset.
"Shiva, this is Junoo. You're out of sector range. Send live coordinates. Repeat, send live coordinates now."
A brief static hissed through the speakers—then Shiva's voice cut in, calm and low:
"Coordinates inbound. Pinging now."
A second later, one of the larger surveillance monitors lit up.
A satellite map loaded, a red dot blinking through dense forest terrain far outside the usual range.
After three hours...
"Three hours deep into the woods,"
Amirtha noted.
"They should have ditched the vehicles."
Guru Arvind muttered, arms crossed.
Outside, the last traces of sunset vanished—
Darkness cloaked the forest.
Crouched behind thick underbrush, Shiva, Ravi, and Sandeep watched the scene ahead, eyes wide.
In a clearing, floodlights revealed a makeshift base.
Corrugated metal shacks.
Weapon crates were stacked like bricks.
A few jeeps.
A generator hums low in the background.
And 20 to 30 armed militants patrolling or seated around the campfire, unaware of the silent eyes upon them.
Ravi whispered,
"This isn't just a hideout... It's a forward operations base."
Shiva's face was grim.
"Heavy arms, radio towers, encrypted comms. This is serious."
Sandeep raised a pair of binoculars.
"I see missile tubes… RPGs… probably smuggled."
Shiva pressed a finger to his earpiece, whispering just enough:
"We have visual. An estimated thirty armed hostiles. The base is set up for long-term use—repeat, long-term. Orders?"
Surveillance Room – Hotel...
Rudra's jaw tightened as he studied the video sent by Shiva.
"They're not amateurs. That's a logistics hub… weapons are being moved in bulk."
Guru Arvind leaned in, voice low but firm:
"We don't engage yet. We observe. Mark faces. Note routines. If we rush it, we burn the intel."
He turned to Rudra.
"But if they're moving in preparation for something bigger…"
Rudra nodded, finishing his sentence.
Nod~
"Then we strike before they scatter."
Rudra looked at the screen, his masked reflection faint in the glass.
"Tell Shiva to hold position. No contact. No mistakes. We're not hunting rabbits…"
His eyes narrowed.
"…we're dissecting a nest."
The cold wind rustled the leaves, carrying the distant murmur of the armed camp.
Shiva leaned against the bark of a tree, tapping his earpiece.
"Mother just gave the word. We hold our position. Rudra's coming."
Both Ravi and Sandeep turned toward him at once, their expressions shifting from cautious to electrified.
"Wait—Rudra?"
Ravi whispered.
"He's joining us?"
Shiva gave a sharp nod.
Nod~
"Yeah. This just turned into a Bramanash op."
The moment hung heavy.
Sandeep chuckled under his breath, adjusting the grip on his short blades.
Chuckle~
"The three of us… Finally, on a real Bramanash mission. Together."
"We trained for this."
Ravi added, eyes gleaming.
"Now it's real."
Shiva cracked his knuckles, grinning.
Grin~
"First mission where we don't just hold the line—we break it."
They all fell silent for a beat, staring at the camp ahead—
Each soldier a shadow, ready to commit unspeakable violence.
Then Ravi murmured, more to himself than the others:
"They won't know what hit them."
Midnight –
Terrorist Camp, Deep Forest...
The camp lay in uneasy silence.
Except for the guards patrolling the perimeter, most of the terrorists were deep in slumber, sprawled around dim fires and scattered crates of weapons.
Then it began.
SWOOSH~ SWOOSH~
The flames from the camp's oil lamps flickered wildly, burning unnaturally bright.
The fire twisted upward, spiralling into the shape of fiery arrows that suddenly shot into the air and rained down like a storm over the camp roofs, igniting them in seconds.
Panic erupted.
Guards looked up, confused and stunned.
One of them reached for the emergency siren.
But before his hand could touch the lever—
Steel flashed.
A katana, glowing faintly blue with runic symbols, pierced through his chest from behind.
Ice immediately spread from the wound, encasing his body into a frozen sculpture.
A second later, the blade was yanked free.
The ice statue shattered.
Revealed behind it stood a masked figure—
His face was hidden behind a polar bear-themed mask, and his armour was glinting under the flames.
Sandeep.
No words.
"____"
Only silence and death in his wake.
Meanwhile, across the camp…
In the armoury, a group of terrorists were hurriedly collecting grenades and rifles.
Among them, one smirking man—
Holding a grenade—
Stepped backwards with a childish grin.
He looked over his shoulder at two others and quipped:
"Catch this surprise, boys."
He pulled the pin and hurled the grenade back inside the armoury—
Just as he jumped clear.
The two inside barely had time to react.
Their eyes widened.
Boom!
The grenade hit a crate of explosives.
A massive explosion erupted, engulfing the armoury in a fiery mushroom cloud.
The shockwave rattled trees across the forest.
The smirking terrorist slowly rose from the wreckage, clothes torn and dust settling over him.
But then—
His body began to shift.
Melt. Reform.
Skin. Voice.
Clothes.
Until the true form emerged:
Ravi.
The Mantradrishti Astra had allowed him to mimic a terrorist's appearance.
Now, with the explosions sowing chaos, he revealed himself.
The hunt had begun.
The massive explosion that obliterated the armoury echoed like a thunderclap across the forest.
Flames clawed into the night sky as screams and sirens followed.
Terrorists all over the camp turned instinctively toward the fire, weapons drawn, confusion thick in the air.
Among them, two figures—
The same terrorists that Rudra had previously let escape—
Stood frozen for a moment.
Their eyes locked.
"____"
"____"
Frustration and dread passed between them.
"It's that masked freak… It has to be,"
One of them muttered, teeth gritted.
Suddenly, a fire from a nearby tent twisted and shifted, forming into a blazing eagle.
Shriek~
With a shriek, it launched at them like a comet.
Ahhhhh~
One of the men screamed as the eagle hit him full force, engulfing him in flames.
The other barely dodged, rolling into the dirt, coughing smoke.
High above them, perched on a massive tree branch, sat Shiva.
His arms folded, eyes cold behind a fox-like mask.
His fingers flicked in practised rhythm, controlling the fire-bird with ease—
A whisper of the Agni Astra pulsing through his veins.
Across the clearing, Ravi, now in his own form, found himself surrounded.
Several terrorists rushed him, shouting, guns raised.
Swoosh~
But before a single trigger could be pulled—
A shuriken whizzed through the air.
It embedded itself clean into one terrorist's eye, dropping him instantly.
Then—
He arrived.
Out from the smoke and chaos strode Kaal Nayan—
Rudra—
His form cloaked in a faint, shimmering aura of the Brahmastra, glowing like divine fire in the night.
Without pause, he dashed forward, a blur of motion.
His fists struck like hammers, sending men flying with the force of his blows.
Bones cracked.
Bodies crumpled.
Reaching behind his back, Kaal Nayan drew out two short staves, swiftly locking them together into a long staff pole.
With a spinning strike, he knocked aside three gunmen at once, the staff crackling with astra energy.
And then—
Snap—
He split the pole into dual short staves again, transitioning seamlessly into a fluid, close-range assault.
Each movement was controlled, devastating, and purposeful.
A spin, a jab, an elbow—
Another man down.
Terrorists barely had time to scream before they were struck down by the force of a warrior trained to eliminate evil at its root.
Aftermath...
Smoke curled into the starlit sky. What was once a fortified terrorist base now lay in ruins—
Charred tents, shattered crates, scattered weapons, and the bodies of every enemy combatant, lifeless in the dark soil.
Among the wreckage stood four silhouettes, battle-worn but unshaken:
Kaal Nayan (Rudra), Shiva, Ravi, and Sandeep.
Each of them, masked and cloaked in the quiet dignity of a warrior, looked around at the devastation they had wrought—
Swift, calculated, and absolute.
"That explosion was a bit overkill, don't you think?"
Shiva said, nudging Ravi with an elbow.
Ravi chuckled, rubbing soot from his arm.
Chuckle~
"Hey, I wanted a dramatic entrance. Besides, they were hogging all the grenades."
Sandeep's mask tilted as he cracked his knuckles.
"I turned one of them into an ice statue. You can't get more artistic than that."
Rudra, still in his Kaal Nayan form, let out a short laugh—
His voice was distorted by the modulator.
"Just make sure you didn't freeze his wallet. Might've had some real estate secrets on him."
The four of them shared a short, victorious moment of laughter.
For the first time,
All of them had fought together as true Brahmanāsh warriors, and their synergy was flawless—
Fire, ice, illusion, and might dance in harmony.
Ravi looked back at the smouldering remains of the base.
"You think they'll be more?"
"Who knows..."
Rudra said grimly.
"But now they were no more. We're the storm they'll dread."
Shiva looked up at the moon peeking through the clouds.
"Let's go."
And with that, the four disappeared into the night, stepping over roots and broken weapons, the smoke trailing behind them like a ghost of their vengeance.
The terrorist camp had been uprooted.
As the four warriors walked through the dim forest, the moonlight slipping through the treetops and casting moving shadows along the path, Rudra suddenly paused.
A metallic chime echoed softly—
Not in the air, but deep within his mind.
[Ding!]
[Task Description: A rogue Astra user has been detected in your sector.
Target: Former Brāhmansh operative – codename Zerak
Activity: Large-scale arms deal in progress. Supplying advanced weapons to a terrorist group.
Estimated destination: Militant hideout (over 60 armed combatants).
Rewards:
• 250 Hope Points
• Instinctive Combat Awareness – Level 2 Upgrade]
Rudra's eyes briefly gleamed behind his mask.
A rush of clarity washed through his senses—
As if the forest around him had just shifted into sharper focus.
"____"
Hoot~ Hoot~
Every leaf rustle, every echo of their footsteps, every distant owl's cry now felt amplified and mapped instinctively in his mind.
"You okay?"
Sandeep asked, noticing his momentary stillness.
Rudra nodded with a faint smile under his mask.
"Yeah. Just… a piece of mind."
Shiva raised a brow.
"___?"
Rudra didn't answer—
Just resumed walking.
But his posture had changed.
His steps were more silent.
His aura was more attuned.
The next morning,
The Highland Leaf stirred awake with the scent of freshly brewed coffee and the chirping of birds outside the misty Ooty hills.
After a night of chaos and action,
Rudra and Guru Arvind sat across from each other in the surveillance room, the soft hum of screens in the background.
"So,"
Arvind began, arms crossed thoughtfully,
"Anish Reddy has finally woken up."
Rudra leaned back slightly, brow raised.
"That's unexpected. After all these days in a coma…"
Arvind nodded.
Nod~
"I need to visit him. Something about the timing doesn't sit right with me. I want you to come with me, Rudra."
Rudra nodded in agreement just as the door creaked open slightly—
Hammy, the tiny squirrel creature with ears too large for her body and eyes far too expressive, peeked in.
Her nose twitched, sensing "trip" in the air.
"Wait, wait, wait—you're going somewhere? Without me?!"
Before Rudra could explain, Hammy leapt with theatrical flair, diving right into the inside pocket of his khaki jacket, poking her head out with a triumphant grin.
Grin~
"No way you're going on an adventure without this girl,"
She squeaked, patting his collar like a queen on her throne.
"Besides, last time you left me here, Shiva tried to make me eat boiled carrots. Again!"
Guru Arvind chuckled softly.
"She's persistent, isn't she?"
Rudra sighed, half-smiling as he looked down at the mischievous fluffball now settling in for the ride.
"There's no arguing with her. She's coming."
Outside, Shiva, Ravi, and Sandeep were already chatting with Amirtha and Junoo.
They had brooms in one hand, inventory lists in the other, and the slightly panicked look of people about to be left in charge of a very magical hotel.
"We've got this covered,"
Sandeep said with confidence.
Rudra gave them a quick salute as he stepped out with Arvind, Hammy's ears flopping with every movement from his pocket.
"Behave, everyone. Especially you, Hammy."
"No promises~!"
She sang, already poking at a stray button in his coat with curiosity.
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(Author's POV)
(A/N):
Thanks for reading the chapter!
Please give a review!!! And power stone!!!
Which will motivate me more?