Bab 33: Abman
Near the edge of a village on the border of Kazakhstan, with a population of barely 150 people.
Three people suddenly appear out of thin air, a child, a young man, and a woman.
*Vomit*
'What in the worl-*vomit* What was that?! How did he just…just move us like that? My head, it's spinning around like a wheel..'
"Ah, Ms. Lalita, are you okay? Don't worry too much, feeling nauseous is a normal reaction when people first teleport, and in your case, since we teleported so far so quickly, it's just a bit more pronounced," said Alaukik, while looking around the area they had come to.
'I bet, I bet he did this on purpose..'
"I see," replied Lalita, controlling herself from puking anymore and standing up straight,
"So, where are we?" she asked.
"I believe we're in a small village on the edge of Kazakhstan, called Abman. We've stopped here to first collect some information, and secondly to allow you to take some rest. Any more teleporting in your condition might just have some unwanted side effects," replied Vinay, as he checked the gps in his hands.
"Exactly where we want to be, Major. Perfect as always," Vinay added.
"Hm. Well, Ms. Lalita, why don't we enter the village and find you a place to rest, while Vinay and I go around and collect information from the villagers. Although by the looks of it, this village doesn't seem to be that much affected by the civil war."
"Very well," came a short reply from Lalita, who was still trying to get her bearings after the teleportation(s). And so the trio started to walk towards the village, and as they did, they started to notice some weird things about the village. The entire village was still very lively, and it didn't seem like anyone in the village was worried about the war. Seeing this, all three of them had the same thought,
'Does this village not know that their country is going through a civil war right now?'
However, despite their thoughts, they still moved forward, not intending to change their plan. And as they entered the village, they very quickly found a small inn, probably for other travellers who wanted to explore the country. Walking in, the only thing the trio saw was an empty reception, and a few tables set beside the entrance. Going up to the reception, Vinay saw a bell on the counter, and gave it a ring. Probably hearing the bell, the trio heard footsteps coming from inside the inn, and out walked a young man. Seeing three people dressed in foreign clothing standing on the other side of the reception, the man smiled brightly and said,
"Welcome to Khursh Inn! How may I help you?" *
Hearing this, Alaukik looked at Vinay, while Lalita just stared at the two of them. Seeing this, Vinay sighed and replied,
"We would like to book two rooms please. One for me and this child here and one for the woman."
"Oh? Did you have a fight with your wife, brother? I'll let you in on a secret, in times like these, it's best to just give up your pride and apologise. That'll help calm them down."
"No no, you mis-"
"I'm not his wife," said Lalita, "We're brother and sister, mister.."
"Mahmood, the name's Mahmood, and I'm in charge of your food. Although if I may say something, you both don't look like siblings at all. I mean, just looking at you beauty mada- " the man said, still smiling brightly.
"Please do give us our rooms mister Mahmood, you see, we're in quite a hurry."
"Very well then," Mahmood replied with a sigh, "Here are the keys to your room. They're straight up ahead, the last two rooms. Each night costs 1000 tenge, food included. No need to pay now, you can pay when you check out."
"Thank you," replied Vinay, taking one of the keys and handing the other to Lalita. Seeing this, Alaukik said,
"So we're done? Then let's go out to collect information." **
"Yes, major."
And so Alaukik and Vinay left the inn, and started walking around the village, talking to the villagers and trying to collect some information. Making their way through the village, Alaukik and Vinay talked to the various villagers they met, and slowly collected some information. After talking to many villagers, Alaukik and Vinay slowly made their way towards a big house in the distance. Having conversed with the other villagers, they knew that was the house of the eldest and most knowledgeable person in the village. He was basically the village leader, and knew nearly everything about the village. However, before they reached the house, they saw the old man sitting on a rocking chair in front of the house, with two of his grandchildren playing around him. He had a bald spot on his head, and had a long, flowing beard that reached his chest. He seemed like he was having lots of fun, playing around with his grandchildren.
Seeing this, suddenly, immense pain hit Alaukik, and he started seeing various images, a burning village in a forest, corpses lying all around with him in the centre of it, laughing like a madman. And as he slowly fell to the ground, more and more of these images started to appear in his mind. Seeing this, Vinay started to panic and immediately supported Alaukik and prevented him from falling, while simultaneously asking,
"Major?! Major! What happened? Are you okay?"
Hearing his voice, Alaukik was able to hold onto reality, and slowly shook himself out of the hallucinations. Shaking his head a bit, still reeling from what just happened, Alaukik said to Vinay,
"Let's head back to the inn for now. We'll discuss our findings with Lalita and then think of a plan to move forward."
Ten minutes later, back at Khursh Inn,
Sitting inside one of the rooms, Alaukik, Vinay and Lalita were discussing the information that Alaukik and Vinay collected.
"So, what did you find out?" asked Lalita.
"Unfortunately, we were not able to collect much information, considering that this village is on the border of the country, and the civil war is taking place in the centre. What we were able to learn is that the rebels are trying to recruit new members from the public to gain an advantage in this war. Of course, the government is preventing this from happening. It seems that this government has morals, and is not forcefully recruiting everyone who can fight to take up arms. We also know the rebel leader calls himself Laumir, and their group is called Hanam. Apparently, they're rebelling because they believe the current government is not fit for ruling them. They're blaming the government for the difference in treatment of magicians and normal people, and are inciting common people around the country to take arms against the government. They're claiming that the government is giving all the resources to the magicians, and is not letting the common people have any. Whether this is true or not, we don't know, but the resource shortage is indeed true." said Vinay.
"So basically, you both weren't able to collect any information. *sigh*, how useless. Very well, from what you've said and some things that are obvious, I have come up with a crude plan. Listen, this is what you have to do…"
After explaining her plan to the duo, Lalita left for her room, stating that she to needed to
"Get my beauty sleep, do you think this beautiful face of mine doesn't need maintenance? *smile/smirk* Ah, my bad major. I forgot you couldn't see, it's a real shame you know, you're missing out on a lot of stuff."
Now alone in their room, Vinay turned to Alaukik and asked,
"What do you think of the plan major?"
To this, Alaukik raised his head and replied,
"Well, it might work, so why not give it a try. It's a pretty simple plan too, and easy to execute. And I'm sure it will be easy to find rebels and soldiers on the many battlefields in the country. All we have to do is capture them, extract information and then keep repeating until we capture someone who knows the location of the leader's of both parties. Now, why don't we also hit the bed, it's been a pretty tiring day."
"Very well Major, but are you okay? You nearly collapsed previously, what happened?"
"Ah that, don't worry, it wasn't anything much. Just a sudden weakness, I guess the fact that I didn't eat breakfast came to bite me in the back.."
"If you say so, Major.." replied Vinay, who was still holding some doubts about it, wondering if Alaukik's health was good or not.
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Back at Blanche HQ for Southeastern Asia,
Standing in one of the meeting rooms, Shi Bai was looking at the man in front of him with utmost respect. After all, he was the man who introduced him to the beautiful world of equality, and the one who is going to lead this part of the world to true equality.
"So, Shi Bai, now that you've been here for a day, how do you feel?"
"It's amazing sir. The way that Blanche is fighting for equality among the masses, and is wanting the best for the world, it just proves to me more that I made the right choice when joining this organisation sir. I was a fool for thinking that this was a terrorist organisation, and being easily led by the police into helping them infiltrate the organisation and provide them information from the inside."
"Indeed, I'm glad you have now understood the truth about our organisation! Now, I want you to know that you're very important to the organisation, and we expect a lot from you. As for what exactly I want you to do, I will tell you now…."
After a while, Shi Bai left the room, smiling happily and started to walk back towards his desk, but then suddenly, he stopped midway and clutched his forehead in pain,
'What in the world am I doing here? Why did I suddenly spill the fact that I was an undercover spy? Oh right! It's because I understood that what the police told me was a lie, and that Blanche is an organisation fighting for true equality. *sigh* To think that the police would fool even a common man in order to crackdown on a noble organisation like Blanche.'
Shaking his head, Bai started walking back to his desk, the smile on his face back again.
Back in the room,
Looking at Shi Bai's actions through the one way glass in his room, the man turned around and sat back in his chair.
"We will need to send him to her one more time. It seems that this one's willpower is stronger than the others."
"He has probably undergone special training," replied a voice from the computer open on the mans' desk.
"Indeed, if not for her, we wouldn't have even known about him. We should be thankful to those three for bringing her to us. She has been a valuable asset to our expansion."
"Indeed. Now, how is our situation there?"
"We have successfully achieved a balance with the government and are now looking to expand our members. Everything should come under our control in a half a year to a year. Then, we can start looking to expand farther and farther."
"Good, and what about our sponsor? Has he made any requests yet?"
"No, and that's the strange thing. He's supplying us with weapons and even CAD's, but has not demanded anything of us except asking us to pick up the pace. The only strange thing he's ordered us to do is to wall our surroundings with thick lead, but then again, that's not anything major. But, as long as he is sponsoring, we don't really need to care about anything else."
"Very well. Remember, she is our top priority. Even if we lose everything, we cannot lose her. With her, climbing back is just a matter of time."
"I know."
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A/N:
* = Spoken in Urdu
** = Spoken in Hindi
Here is the full chapter as promised! Also, any thoughts on what I could improve? Comment and let me know. If you don't tell me, I wont know!
Check out the auxiliary chapter on how to get me to write an extra chapter!
I know I should have probably spent more time developing characters, and they might seem 2D, but well, I'm too lazy to rewrite like the entire first volume of the novel. I might add to it after finishing the novel, but well, that's far off in the future. As of now, I'll try my best to develop the characters introduced for now, and show their traits / humanity.
Thank you for reading and as always, have a great day!
PERTIMBANGAN PENCIPTA 
SoManyAngels
SoManyAngels Here is the full chapter as promised! Also, any thoughts on what I could improve? Comment and let me know. If you don't tell me, I wont know!
Check out the auxiliary chapter on how to get me to write an extra chapter!
I know I should have probably spent more time developing characters, and they might seem 2D, but well, I'm too lazy to rewrite like the entire first volume of the novel. I might add to it after finishing the novel, but well, that's far off in the future. As of now, I'll try my best to develop the characters introduced for now, and show their traits / humanity.
Thank you for reading and as always, have a great day!
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone