He turned around and started walking towards his house, people of the village just stood there motionless and wordless watching him pass by, they did not have pity in their eyes for the ‘good’ man driven out of his home, they did not feel remorse when they were used as a hostage to push him out of the village which he had lived for the past decade, they did not feel gratitude for the benefactor who helped them earn a living before the apocalypse and helped re-build their village after the apocalypse, they did not feel respect for the man who without a second thought uprooted everything he had. No they felt fear deep fear of a man able to kill a legion of soldiers in a single punch and not even break a sweat, instead get thanked by the opposition for not annihilating the them. Relieved that they had come out of this ordeal unscathed, the villagers let out the breath they had held in, once the couple were out of earshot.

“Phew…. thought we were goners there” said Arshad a villager from Kishunpali.

“Whew…. me too. You saw what that monster did to the army right?” said Arif another villager

“We saw it too dude, the crazy mofo was monster, didn’t realize we were living with one this whole time. That was a close call, SOB could have snapped us out of existence if he wanted” said Victor

“Can’t believe my son worked for that monster!! He was innocent, wish he doesn’t get dragged into this” said Usha

Hearing what Usha said, set the square into commotion, because his was the largest company in this part of the country and paid the most generously, employing almost half the village working population. Nobody wanted to be associated with him for the fear of persecution of allied armies.

“Hey why should we be the ones being brought under the scanner, weren’t Shoaib and Tommy his most trusted proteges” Rupesh an employee of Sagar’s company.

“The fuck do you mean by that, all ever wanted from that fucking beef-cake was how he caught the fishes, his sailing and exploration techniques I don’t give a shit who he’s fucking over” said Shoiab

“Yeah, I agree. Besides did we not ditch him once we mastered the trade. If we had any connection do you think any of us would leave the goose laying all those golden eggs and move to start up on our own. I smelled something weird about him from the get go” said Tommy

“Heh say the people who took money from him to establish their own company. How do we know you weren’t one of the people paid off by him? Seems too good a story to be true” said Ramesh with look of derision on his face

“Oh do come down from your high horses, my lord knight Ramesh” said Tommy in a sarcastic tone “I do remember you thanking him for the humongous sum he gave, cause your brother died in the apocalypse?”

“Hmph…” shamed in public Ramesh continued with a red face “What I gathered from their conversation was that the guy was a devil worshiper of sorts. Could be that kid he brought home” suddenly a realization dawned on him “could be the amputee baby he brought home. He brought it right after the apocalypse, could it be that the baby is the devil spawn who he prays to”

“Now that you mention it, he did disappear right before the apocalypse” said Aman “Claiming to go on some fake expedition to look for a mermaid when I clearly said it was a dugong”

“Now the pieces of the puzzle seem to be falling into place, his frequent visits, to the sea, his mysterious past, his wife who could kill four sages as if puppets and finally his own strength” said Rama another villager

“Yeah, don’t forget why would the tycoon with his wealth live in obscurity in our little village” said Usha trying to get the army’s attention off her own son

“Do not forget his business prowess. What else could it be other than devil powers which let him and his troop of fishing vessels, catch those large amount of fishes” said Shoaib

Hearing this a lot of the villagers snickered and few and of them outright laughed at him “Don’t pile your incompetence to devil’s powers” said someone from the crowd

“Hee hahahahaha heehaw heehaw” laughed the crowd on the two who seemed like fools

“Silence” shouted Swapandas, who seemed to come out from his meek persona he displayed in front of the Sagar and Alicia

Quiet returned to the village square, people were nervous not to be piled up Sagar in his crime, just cause they were unknowingly harbouring him

“You useless village hicks think this a show for you to discuss about? That man is probably the biggest criminal in history of this planet, he is responsible for harbouring the devil spawn who is directly linked to the apocalypse which almost killed all life on the planet. If not for our benevolent Lord Pruthu we would all probably be piles of dust or would have just reverse aged into nothingness. You think this is matter you the people of a backward countryside village would even begin to comprehend? So shut up”

“Sire” said a person referring to the Swapandas “May I speak my mind if you……”

“Who the fuck are you? Do you not comprehend the meaning of Shut up?”

“Sire I am Murali Kishandas the chief of this vill….”

“The fuck am I supposed to do then”

“Sire, I just wanted to clarify that my village and its people did not have any knowledge of the devil worshipper and his activities. We are innocent in this whole incident”

“Hmph…. You think any criminal would ever accept his crime. I have seen criminal who don’t accept their crime even at the end of their sentence”

“Sire, please tell me what we can do prove our innocence”

“Hmph….” stared the prime minister at the chief.

As if the answer suddenly dawned on to the chief and he spoke with head bowed “Where are my manners my lord, you must be tired from the journey and using your immense power to drive evil away, please come with me I will arrange refreshments for you and your companions”

“Ramesh” called the minister “take the rest of the army away once the devil worshipper has left the village and leave your bodyguard troop here with me”

“As you order sire” shouted the general Ramesh Rathore, as he commanded the army of almost 5 million to turn around slowly. The army left three days after Sagar had vacated.

The chief order his personal attendant to show the minister the way to his mansion. While they were on their way, chief slipped back to a person and said “Order Sara to send five of her youngest and freshest virgins to my mansion in an hour” the person nodded and ran swiftly on.

While the villagers were trying to ‘buy’ their way out, the couple were plodding along their way to their house,

“Sorry I made the decision without you….”

“Nah, did not want to live with these pipsqueaks anyway. Just, for my information, you did know what these bugs used to say about you behind your back right”

“Heh. An elephant continues plodding along while dogs keep barking, that is how the world works I guess”

“Those bastards Shoaib and Tommy think we did not know their intent”

“Heh heh”

“I know you wanted to bear their burden to ease your guilt about that rat, but I think you have done enough, the village is now self-sufficient”

“Hmm”

“Hey where do you want to go next”

“Me……. I have a certain place in mind. It’s a reasonably sized, away from any civilisation, it’s not yet been colonised yet, you can sure of that”

“Hmm…. What’s the view like”, she asked with an innocent pondering look

“oh the view is spectacular, facing the ocean, our favourite” said he with a cheeky grin

“Oh that so. What’s the situation about food?”

“Food huh, we’ll have to do something about that”

“I am not that picky about food”

“Hmm…. but there isn’t any food there”

“What do you mean nothing there? We can hunt and eat right?”

“There isn’t anything to hunt there”

“What??? Then how do we survive”

“We could fish”

“You me to eat fish every day?”

“Hmm, that could be a problem.” With a smirk “I do have a solution for that”

As they reached their residence, they saw Rhodos, feeding baby Kush some cow milk using a wooden spoon.

“I heard that had a hit out against us”

“Like anyone could ever harm a single hair on my son’s head”

“You know we have another one to take care of right”

“Even I might not be able to hurt a single hair on her head in a few years, hahahahahaha”

“It’s good to have a son who I can raise”

“But Sagar, isn’t endurance the worst characteristic trait to have among humans” said Rhodos

“Heh, this child has survived through the largest disaster this world has ever seen, despite being just being born, there is no way is hell he is going to be weak”

“Heeeeehhh, that’s just some wishful thinking” said Rhodos

“Hehe, guess so”

“Anyway we are moving out”

“Are we going on a vacation?”

“Nah moving to a better place”

“Yay, new place, new place, new place” said the excited Rhodos

“Babe step back just a bit” he said with a grin. He sunk his hand into the ground and started cleaving splitting the land.”

People who were sent to follow Sagar’s movements were found a few days later.

When Swapandas sent a spy to check up on the exile of Sagar, the entire land which belonged to Sagar was missing an entire area of 10000 Acres including his huge mansion was missing from the village with none the wiser.

“Plop”, the spy fell on his butt. It was then that he realized, not even a 50 million strong armies would have mattered, this guy was a beast of epic proportions.

 

 

 

A few days later….

“Honey, did we really have to come this far from civilisation”

“It not so bad. Its like we own this planet”

“Sigh……”

They sat in a lawn chair, looking at 4 km of their old land ahead of them, which was pierced through into one of the spike like peaks jutting out from below the water surface, in front of them was another 20 km of dark black land with a pretty good slope which leads to the centre which had a peak jutting out of it which is also 6.5 km high. This was the peak-island where Sagar had found Kush. He had yet to determine if this land was arable but he planned to make this land habitable, a place no one could displace him from. A place he would call home.