Ashish Rudra stood at the doorway like a painting that had somehow learned to breathe — tall, composed, irritatingly well-arranged — while Eklavya was fairly certain his own hair still looked like he had fought a minor war with gravity and lost.
The contrast was almost offensive.
“Eklavya,” Ashish said with that calm, infuriatingly gentle smile of his, “come on. Dad is calling for dinner today.” That single sentence was enough to straighten Eklavya’s spine.
Their father calling everyone together was not routine; it was an event, the sort of thing that usually followed a breakthrough, a crisis, or a lecture disguised as family bonding. “Dad… calling everyone?” he muttered under his breath, suspicion creeping in.
Ishant Rudra was not a man of spontaneous sentiment. Still, Eklavya swallowed his questions. Took a quick bath to wash off the faint scent of blood and cultivation sweat — which he privately suspected was not the aroma his mother preferred at dinner — and followed his brother through the corridor.
Inside their parents’ chamber, a small round table had been arranged with deliberate care. Ishant sat straight-backed, composed, eyes sharp even in stillness. Aashi radiated warmth beside him, her smile blooming the moment Eklavya entered as if she had been waiting precisely for that second. “Congratulations, dear, on your breakthrough,” she said, pride soft but unmistakable in her voice.
Eklavya blinked, caught between surprise and embarrassment. “Thank you, Mother.”
Eklavya thought, ‘How did they come to know?’
They sat, and the meal unfolded with unusual gentleness — Ashish asking about his cultivation progress. Aashi insisted he eat more as though chakra breakthroughs burned calories like a furnace, and Ishant watched in silence, assessing, measuring, weighing something unspoken behind his steady gaze.
The warmth at the table felt almost suspicious. Eklavya half-expected someone to reveal this was an elaborate illusion technique. When the meal ended and hands were cleaned, Ishant finally spoke, his voice level and decisive. “Eklavya, follow me.” The air shifted. Eklavya glanced once at his mother and brother — both calm, both expectant — then nodded. “Good night,” he said quietly before stepping after his father.
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Ishant’s pace through the corridors was measured, heavy with intention rather than fatigue, and they soon entered the clan’s treasure room — a place Eklavya had seen but never truly been invited to understand. Without explanation, Ishant pressed a square stone embedded in the wall. The floor beneath them moved soundlessly, sinking to reveal a dark opening as smooth as controlled breath.
No grinding stone, no theatrical rumbling — just quiet inevitability. A staircase spiralled downward into shadow. Eklavya’s heartbeat quickened despite himself. His father stepped forward first. “Come.” The descent felt longer than it should have been, lit only by pale white lantern flames that burned without smoke or flicker, casting an almost sacred stillness over the carved walls.
When they reached the bottom, a vast underground chamber opened before them, pillars rising like silent guardians, ancient engravings catching the faint glow in shifting patterns. At the centre stood a stone platform.
Above it, five jade stones floated in slow rotation, etched with runes that pulsed faintly as though alive, as though aware. Eklavya stared, breath thinning. His father stepped onto the platform and extended his hands; the stones lowered gently, obediently, like loyal disciples recognising their master. Ishant gathered them and turned. “These belong to you.”
The words landed heavier than the jade itself. “What do you mean?” Eklavya asked, confusion plain. Ishant’s expression softened — not fully, but enough to fracture the iron composure he usually wore. “Now that you have reached the sixth stage of the Chakra-Opening Realm, it is time. You will understand one day. These techniques… are yours to master.”
There were questions — dozens — but they tangled inside Eklavya’s chest. Today had already delivered spatial rifts, blood pools, hidden power, and now a secret technique from underground chambers. He accepted the stones carefully with both hands, feeling the faint vibration within them, and stored them inside his ring. “Go,” Ishant said as they ascended back toward the surface. “Rest and cultivate.”
Eklavya returned to his room in silence, the mansion strangely quiet around him, as if even the walls were holding their breath. Sitting on his bed, he exhaled slowly, staring at nothing. First, the blood pool. Then the breakthrough. Now, hidden jade techniques from a secret chamber beneath the clan. “What,” he muttered softly to himself, running a hand through his hair, “is happening today… and should I be worried?”
